


You and Me and We

by Pieri



Category: Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: Baby Fic, F/M, Kid Fic, Pregnancy, Pregnant Sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-22
Updated: 2015-10-04
Packaged: 2018-04-05 13:18:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 21,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4181262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pieri/pseuds/Pieri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Are you hungry?” Furiosa asks as she undoes the clip at her shoulder, drops the arm on a stone work bench. Her other heavier arm is on it, belts and all.</p>
<p>“Is it mine?” Max asks bluntly.</p>
<p>Prompt: She gets pregnant, but Max is what we'd consider "Mom"</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It’s better when he goes his own way, Max thinks. It’s what he reminds himself when the voices whisper at the back of his skull. They’re quieter now, but they whisper like the wind on the dunes on quiet nights. It’s better when he goes his own way, but he knows better now than to judge when east turns into west and he finds his steel ride pointed towards the Citadel—what they call Water Town now. 

Time gets muddled when you’re out on the sands, but it hasn’t been so long since he’s seen the tall peaks, specked with steadily growing green. He isn’t sure how recent, but he has a gift, and his motor hums, mirroring the contemplative hum from his throat. It’s not a bad gift. 

Scouts spot him first and wave him through, and that isn’t good, Max’s mind supplies. He starts to formulate the unused words. He could have a shooter in the back seat, a gun pressed to the back of his chair, ready to shoot through his spine the moment he raises the alarm. They should check. He’ll let her know. 

At the gates they stop him, check his car. He grunts in appreciation. They do not ask for his firearm, and the war pup doesn’t ask after his gift, a green vial he clutches close. Which is fine, the words are still knitting together. Not as bad as those many, many days ago. 

He finds Cheedo first. As the youngest of the sisters, he finds she changes the most when he’s been away, but there’s barely a new wrinkle on her skin. Not so long ago then. 

“Hello,” Cheedo says. There’s a war pup at her side. 

“Hallo,” Max parrots back, and waits for more to parrot. But Cheedo doesn’t speak, just purses her lips. 

After a moment she looks down at the pup, who’s staring up at Max with a wide grin. His skin isn’t stark white, but he paints his lids, the ridge of his nose, and his brows dark like pitch. It reminds him of…

“Dowel, fetch Furiosa,” Cheedo asks, and the pup—Dowel—nods once and takes off running, sparing a look over his shoulder for the wanderer. 

Cheedo doesn’t speak immediately, she looks down at the papers in her hands. 

Social etiquette isn’t one of Max’s strong suits, yet, her body language—she won’t look at him, clucks her tongue at something written—says she’s… mad? He isn’t sure. 

His shoulders slope slightly, and he ducks his head to look over her shoulder. The paper is fresh, not like the dusty browned pages in the books in the sisters’ rooms.

“New?” He asks, pokes at whatever scab has formed. Cheedo isn’t as fragile as she once was, she throws herself into projects, she likes to learn. Is a boy causing her trouble—or maybe a girl?

“Mm.” For a moment he thinks it’s a lost cause. But Cheedo has learned to be proud. “Hemp. Once we got it to take it grows like a weed. It wasn’t so hard to make paper, once we got the hang of it.” 

“You? Figured it out.” That’s got her to smile, he can tell though her hair covers her face. He’s almost won her, he thinks, but she looks up suddenly and her eyes are hard.

“Max.” 

They’re interrupted by the heavy stomps of war pup as Dowel thunders toward them. She’s coming he says, and Max can’t help it. He turns and his feet move, hands clutching the glass vial in his hand. 

She wasn’t far behind the pup, and he’s face to face with her a moment later as his hand stretches out—but then the world stops. 

Furiosa takes the vial in her metal hand, teases off the cork and tips the gift into her flesh palm. 

She examines Max’s gift of seed (fruit, he was told) from many dunes away and laughs—it sounds ironic when her metal hand, still grasping the vial, presses against the swell of her stomach. 

“Come with me,” Furiosa says and Max follows.

xxx

The world is quiet, or so it seems to Max. There’s still noise, the pounding of feet, metal on metal, the pumping of water. But Max’s world has gone quiet. 

If Furiosa asked him to jump from the top of Water Town’s peaks, he’d ask if she had a favorite spire to see him off. Survival or not.

She looks different, in the obvious ways, but in less clear ways as well, he thinks as he follows her through the corridors that make up the ant hill-like city.

He remembers before. A beautiful woman with curled hair. A long dress not dirtied by sand flowing over the curve of her belly.

Furiosa does not look like this, but that doesn’t make her any less beautiful.

Her arm is different. Slimmer. Likely weighs less, though maybe less powerful. There are less straps mounting it in place, and none are around her middle. There is no room. Instead it loops around her side and around her shoulder. Wouldn’t be as good in a fight. If the arm got stuck it would pop her shoulder. 

No good. No good at all. 

She is speaking. 

“I’ll give them to Dag, we’ll see if they germinate.” She’s talking about the gift. He doesn’t care about the gift. Not now. “Do you know what they are?”

“Fruit.” She’s begun climbing the steps and he pauses. She still walks with authority, every movement of her body a declaration of her space. But there’s a sway, like when the arm falls to the ground and Furiosa needs that split second to find her center. It’s like that. She looks annoyed, one hand rising to press against the rock wall. 

She’s reminded him of…

“When Dag was heavy, she took the lift.” His memory shifts. It’s hard, sometimes when he’s out under the sun it doesn’t seem to line up in sequence. But he remembers when the Dag was heavy and a curly haired woman in a long sun dress. 

“I am not so heavy that I cannot walk,” Furiosa snaps and steps forward, upwards, weight heavy with purpose. When she stops to press her hand against the wall again she pauses, sighs, and looks over her shoulder. Her eyes are as brilliant as he remembers.

“Come on then.” Her metal arm, the heavier one, lifts for him to take.  
Furiosa is not so proud as to not ask for help when she needs to accomplish a task. But walking to her rooms should not be as life or death as overthrowing the Immortan, or liberating Gas Town, or chasing down swindling desert cheats. That one was fun, he remembers. 

“On the next level we take the lift.” Against him he can hear her sigh. 

“You are worse than Hospic.” For a moment she almost sounds warm. 

When they’re on even ground Furiosa shakes him off, nods at those she passes. The pups are eager to please, and some stop her to tell her of tellings of. She nods seriously at each, but excuses herself and continues to the lift. 

They do not speak while it rumbles to life, nor as they walk to her rooms. Well-sized, but not extravagant. He knows these rooms well. 

“Are you hungry?” Furiosa asks as she undoes the clip at her shoulder, drops the arm on a stone work bench. Her other heavier arm is on it, belts and all.

“Is it mine?” Max asks bluntly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can be hit up on [Tumblr!](http://pieribee.tumblr.com/)


	2. Chapter 2

He wouldn’t presume to be her only, not when he comes and goes, like a dog uncertain where the scent lies. It’s an honest question and his eyes gleam.

Furiosa appreciates bluntness and honesty. “She’s yours.”

Max stills, and it shows how much he _moves_. She always forgets how much he moves, until he’s back. He blinks, licks his lips, is always tilting his head side-to-side. Always aware of his surroundings, taking them in. Now he’s gone quiet, silent, and his eyes are trained on hers. Large and round and they drop to her belly, which is large and round. 

She’s tired, and her boots stopped being comfortable weeks ago, but she can be stubborn. 

He comes and goes without any schedule. Sometimes gone for as short as 80 days, or the long stretches of hundreds. She saw him last… 200 days give or take. He isn’t lean, but he always eats like a stray when he’s been gone. Food may shock him back to her, it may—

No, he’s moving now. She watches him pace, his boots scuffing against the floor as he walks towards the bed, then back around towards the door. Will he leave, she wonders, her lips pressed into a rue grin. She knows Max. Knows how he’ll react in a fight, when she should duck and when he’ll need to reload. She knows that even during his long stays he’s not chatty, and knows there are some parts of him that are too caked with dust—that he’d rather not polish. There are parts of her like that too.

She opens her mouth to speak, to perhaps assure that expectations won’t be necessary. He beats her to it.

“She?” He licks his bottom lip, shoulders sloped. 

“Or he.” She shrugs. 

Furiosa knows Max, knows that words will flow swifter in the coming days (assuming he stays. She thinks he will), but Max opens his mouth and fights to form his thought. 

“In the old days. Back then, they used to be able to know. They’d tell you, if you wanted.”

That’s true, she knows that, but she hasn’t thought about it. There are parts of Max that are too dirtied, parts he’s never offered up, but she wonders now. His eyes flick over her, then back to her stomach. His hand twitches. 

Perhaps he isn’t worse than Hospic. Perhaps he’s worse than Cheedo. She sighs, gestures towards herself, “You can.”

He closes the distance in a moment, hand twitching tentative, eyes on hers as his palm presses against her belly. 

“Started kicking—oh, 30 or 40 days ago.” 

“Mm.”

She pulls up her shirt, so his palm can press against her skin. The shirt is like a tent, she thinks, annoyed. It has an extra panel sewn into the back. No scrap goes unused, not when plant fibers take long to knit together into clothing.

Eyes focused, Max rubs his hand over the top of her belly, then flicks his pointer finger above her navel. It doesn’t hurt, but her question is answered when she feels a firm kick and he laughs. It pops from his unused throat. She smiles too. 

“He’s a fighter.”

Max nods, hums low in his throat, “Yes. That.” Furiosa kisses him then. Hard. 

His lips are chapped, more so than she remembers, but that’s just fine. Her own are chapped too, and she licks into his mouth and loves the way she can hear him groan. That’s just fine too. His broad hand smoothes around her belly, comes to rest on her lower back. Which feels good, but she’s sore there. Max takes a step back and she steps with him, shoulders blocking him in the way she likes, the way she knows he likes. 

Her stomach bumps against him. 

She can feel the quiet laughter in his chest while she groans. “I’m big,” she says and it’s a complaint.

“Yes,” he agrees, as his big hands settle on her hips. His head rests against hers and he smells like the road. She misses the road, even the dust. You can’t drive a rig when your stomach keeps you from reaching the pedals. “Soon?”

“Not so soon. I’m just _big_.” 

“So you are.” He kisses her again, but not before she sees the way his eyes crinkle in the corners. They smile for him. As he moves they bump again. So she is. 

“I have work to do.” 

That much is true, but her blunt nails scrap against his sides. His clothing is filthy, all of him is. But she doesn’t mind. She says she has work to do, but what she means is, _hurry up._

She wants to block him against the wall, like she’s done in the past. Mark territory with her hips and shoulders, wants to bite and partake and hear him give and take. 

Max’s hand grips under her arm, pushes her gently back. For a moment she’s furious. 

“If you’re going to tell me what I _can_ and _can’t_ do, then—”

“Mm, no.” Her eyes stay trained on his as he leads her backwards towards her bed. “But, let me.” 

Well, it’s a compelling argument. “It’s annoying.” Did she always complain so much? She doesn’t think so, but he’s back, and he’s part of the reason she’s in this situation. Her voice pitches up, mimicking, “’You’ll hurt yourself.’ ‘You’ll hurt the baby.’”

Max clucks his tongue, which for him is carrying a conversation. His fingers brush up from her hips to her waist, then higher. “…Tender?”

“Very.” Not in the good way. Her own hands push his back down to her hips, where they undo the knot of her pants, push them down. She’s sick of a lot of things, including these clothes. “I was worried you know, that they wouldn’t find me very imposing when I was pregnant.” 

“Not worried anymore?” The backs of her knees brush against her bed and she sits. He settles between her knees on the ground.

“No. They’re terrified.” 

“Mm, should be.” Max’s hands glide across her bare thighs. She’s big, sore, her veins show blue even under her tanned skin. When he looks up his eyes are _hungry._

So is she. 

When their lips meet again, they meet slower. Furiosa’s hand circles around his neck, fingers scratching into the scruff of his hair. He needs a trim and a wash up. But that can wait. When they part his head stays near, the air is thick and warm and she breathes in his breath.

“Hurry up.”

“No patience.”

“None at all,” she confirms. Watches hungrily as he lifts one of his fingers to his mouth, sucks the digit in. His lips are wet with her spit, shine in the light. She licks her own as his hand drops down and his lips find hers again. 

The spit wasn’t necessary, no, she’s already wet. But it was good for show. His fingers slip through her folds easily, gather up her slick and rub against her clit. She missed this—she’ll admit—it can be hard to admit, but she missed this. She missed him. Cheedo would think her terribly romantic. 

His fingers slip inside her and it feels good, but it’s not enough and she lets him know. Tries to slide backwards onto the bed but he stops her. 

“No, let me…”

Ah. 

His head ducks, forehead pressed against her stomach. For just a moment. Then he sinks lower, breathes deep and presses his nose against the thatch of hair between her legs. 

Ah. 

That’s good, she thinks, just as his tongue flicks out against her and her hand tightens in his hair. She missed him and also… certain parts of him. His tongue, she thinks, is an excellent part of him. 

Max throws himself into his task with abandon, and every flick of his tongue or press of fingers within her sends tremors through her body. She feels like a coiled spring or an engine that yearns to squeal to a start. Pressures building, her legs tighten and Max—Max goes off stroke. 

“Oh you absolute _shit,_ ” she groans, kicks her foot against his side. She can feel him laugh, the vibrations running through her legs as she urges him on. “I’ve had to do this myself, get on with it.” 

She doesn’t have time to kick him again, his fingers roll in deep, the flat of his tongue presses hard against her. She does have time to curse, a well-meaning “ _Fuck_ ,” as her legs stutter and tighten against the sides of his skull and her hand twists in his hair. 

That’s one thing she didn’t expect (though many mothers before her would have told her), that she would crave touch no matter how bulky she became. That she would crave it more. Her hand will do, but Max sets her body into overdrive, a v-8 engine clamoring, filled to the brim with guzzoline. 

As the waves slow and her muscles relax Max gives her a final lick, and if his lips looked shiny earlier with spit, now he’s drenched in slick. Furiosa hauls him up with her arm, licks the taste of herself off his lips and sighs with it. “I want you in me.”


	3. Chapter 3

His groan is a yes, but he breaks apart to look her in the eye, then down at her. 

“They say to be careful,” she says defensively, “but it will be fine.”

“Mm. It will, you will.” 

At least that’s not the problem. She’s heard many tales, from women from the village below and from the women who were once milk mothers. About how this or that will harm the child growing within her. But if that isn’t the problem… her eyes narrow. Furiosa isn’t a vain woman, but. 

Max urges her backwards to lie back. One of her blankets is rolled up and he slides forward to urge her hips up, so he can slide it beneath her. It isn’t… uncomfortable.

“Good?” He asks, and she likes the way his face is flushed. “You could…” His hand rises and gestures idly before she realizes what he means. Yes, she could ride him. A good thought, but—

“I want to see you work. Strip.” 

That seems to work and he straightens up to pull the shirt above his head. There are new scars, just as there are new scars on her. Hopefully she’ll have time to learn them. 

Before he can strip the rest off he needs to undo the clasps on his brace, and she watches appreciatively as the muscles in his arms tighten in the low light. 

Furiosa is not a vain woman. There was never a time in her life where such things would matter to her. Not when she was young, a daughter of the Vuvalini, and not when she was older, a soldier sweating in the wastelands, working her way up to imperator. Imperators must be strong, so Furiosa became strong. Imperators must be able-bodied, so Furiosa made her disability a bone crushing strength. 

Sometimes, when they throw like this, she keeps the arm on. Likes the way it sounds and how she can direct and touch and command with two arms, one metal and one flesh. Many other times, like now, she leaves it off. Likes the way she can direct and touch and command, with only the flesh. 

Max’s brace falls to the floor and his trousers come next. No, Furiosa is not a vain woman. But she feels very powerful, though large and sluggish (so she feels), as she watches how his body responds so well. His eyes burning. 

Heat pools in her belly, or maybe it never left, and he slips above her, forehead ducking to rest against hers. God she’s warm all over. Breathing deep she can feel him take residence within her chest, like her heart will burst. And he isn’t even in her, yet. 

His fingers brush down to gather slick from between her legs and the touch against her sensitive flesh makes her shiver. He’s hard, he’s been hard, but he’s also been so patient. He exercises patience now, as his hand rubs his prick with her slick. She can tell it’s difficult, from the set of his jaw and the furrow of his brow. It makes her want him more than anything she’s ever wanted. 

An exaggeration surely, but Furiosa allows herself an exaggeration now and again. Her ankle slips around his back, pulls him forward and he straightens himself, readying…

God she wants him, but—

He must notice, though she isn’t sure, but his eyes question and she clears her throat. “It’s nothing, they just say…” The baby this, the baby that. Surely they’re just crone tales, but.

His eyes soften. “We can stop, but—she’ll be fine.” One of his hands curves around the slope of her belly, the other, still wet from her, folds into her hand. “I promise.”

There are parts of Max she knows she’s not privy to and perhaps another woman, or a woman in another situation, would be sick with curiosity. A slow burn jealousy. What she does know is that Max doesn’t make idle promises. If he promises, then he knows. If he knows, then he’s been in this situation before. Which means, 

She relaxes, nods. His lips twitch into a smile and he releases her hand, takes hold of himself. 

The stretch is divine. Her breathe catches as he slides within her, not slowly, not quickly. _Perfect._ It feels like a different perfect and she feels his groan vibrate through her thighs.

There’s too much stomach between them for him to lean forward, but his profile is sharp, a collection of muscles, scars, and flat planes. She’s happy to watch as his hips roll back, roll forward, every motion and breathe between them causing fire in her veins. 

She considers herself an active participant, but Max’s hands slide over her thighs, grip beneath them, and there’s something to be said for putting him to work, she thinks, as her hips roll to meet his. Can’t help the breathy moan that punches from her lips, or was it his? 

Light glints over his chest, his hair sticks up in chaos. Furiosa’s chest aches, not pain, but near enough. Her body is on fire, an itch that can’t be scratched taking root in her. She feels more sensitive than she’s ever felt before, barks out a gasp as his hand drifts down to where they meet. 

She’s so _sensitive_ and her hand snakes down to pull his still. It feels phenomenal, but she wants to ride this one out. “Not yet,” she spits out between grit teeth.

“Ok?” 

“Great,” Max is a man of few words and he’s no different when he fucks. Man of few words but many noises. Furiosa is by no means chatty, but comparatively… “It’s different, it’s fuck—yes, _there._ ” 

A ghost of his smile and she wants to curse again. Max’s hips quicken and while she cannot lean up to claim his lips, his hands stiffen under her thighs, hoist her up, and she can feel the air change. The usually cool air of the inner rooms feels hot and humid and it rushes through her chest, as heat, heat, _heat_ pulls deep in her pelvis. Her hand stays firm on his because she doesn’t need the push, she wants to feel the pressure build until she bursts. 

Furiosa comes with a shout and a clink of her teeth as her jaw snaps shut. Her back arches off the bed and her body’s a livewire, gone electric as her heels dig into Max’s back, pulls him flush as she burns through it. Her fingers release his, tangles down to press hard as she rides the waves. She can still feel him as his motions grow jerky and he groans, deep and animalistic, but so warm and good. 

When she can see straight she pants and licks her lips. His chest is shiny with sweat, his shoulders pulled forwards, holding himself up but looking down at her with clear eyes and a heaving breath. 

She almost doesn’t want him to pull away, but she wants him closer. When she directs him with a nudge of her foot, he falls beside her and she places her hand against the rapid pounding of his chest. He’s warm and hot and bubbling alive, just like the little one that’s taken space within her. She leans in close, presses her nose against his throat, licks up the salt and sighs. 

Max hums, arm reaching behind her to press against the small of her back.


	4. Chapter 4

Afterwards her breath is even, but not the slow even breath of sleep. She’s awake, she’s thinking, and Max knows she has something to say. He waits for her, eyes tracing the rock wall. Even he knows there are things to be said. 

“I thought about,” her arm, the stump, touches the side of her swollen belly, “I thought about not keeping—her.” Not unreasonable, Max thinks. Not unreasonable at all, though his brow creases at the thought. “What do you think of that?” 

Ah. It takes time for him to respond and she waits patiently, her breath never dropping into sleep. 

“I think given the… way the world’s burnt, you may have been… justified in doing. That.” He licks his lips as he fights for what comes next. “Why didn’t you?”

His answer doesn’t seem to displease her and she’s thoughtful when she continues. “My mother was Mary Jo Bassa and I learned many things from her. Things my initiative mother could not teach. Most of all, she taught me hope. Even if I forgot what that was for a long time.” Furiosa’s cool eyes turn to regard him. “We need to believe this world is worth it. Otherwise why do what I do?”

They’re quiet after that, his hand on her hip. There are things to be said, but not everything needs to be said at once. She never relaxes into sleep, instead pulling herself upwards. She doesn’t accept help as she struggles upright, so Max doesn’t offer.  


She washes in a basin before leaving to return to her tasks, and Max washes too. He has a few options. He could follow her, which he has done in the past. The urge to follow and watch—to be certain she is safe is strong, but Furiosa wouldn’t like that. No. Not at all. 

Max can feel himself stitch back together the longer he stays in the caverns of Water Town. Words come quicker, so do thoughts. Which are—

He paces, quick, retracing his steps from earlier. Earlier they were animalistic, now they are perhaps still…

Furiosa is pregnant and he… helped. She had looked at him calmly when she told him, answered honestly and he remembers the look in her eyes. She wouldn’t ask for anything from him that he wouldn’t offer. She has no expectations, but something in him pulls uncomfortably at the thought. 

And yet that feeling within him digs its heels into the dirt. The part that always whispers to _go_. To get away. The voice of the sort of man who handcuffed another to a car with two options. Saw or guzzoline. 

The one who knew a curly haired woman and a child who never grew to call him, 

“Max.” Ah. “Da.” She’s been quiet. The Sproglet, the one who grew. 

She stands at Furiosa’s door and raises her hand. He mirrors. She doesn’t strike out and no arrows clunk through his hand missing his brain. It’s a greeting. It’s theirs. 

Sproglet has been quiet since the many days since the battle on Fury Road. Sometimes he can hear her laughing, just out of earshot. Sometimes she’s angry. Which is ok. Sometimes he’s angry too. 

“Come on Max.”

He inclines his head at her. “Ok.” 

Sproglet leads him through corridors, up higher levels. He’s greeted, he’s recognized, even with the scruff on his chin and the dirt in his hair. 

He nods at a few. Some he recognizes, others eyeball him. One leans over and asks a pup, who leans in to tell the tale. 

Max’s eyes stay on Sproglet. Sometimes he sees her duck around corners and other times she seems to stare straight at him. If she walks backwards or is pulled by an invisible string he isn’t sure. But her gaze doesn’t darken so he isn’t…

Afraid. 

No, not so afraid anymore. The higher they go the warmer the air becomes. Warmer and wetter. A strange feeling for someone who knows the bleak sucking heat of the parched desert best. He knows where they’re going before he sees the tools, the metal spades and metal bins. 

But he has to know where they’re going, technically, doesn’t he?

Long ago he thought maybe he was cursed, chased by ghosts. Then he thought he was mad. Now he doesn’t mind. It comes and goes. Sproglet ducks around one of the hydroponic systems. There are still more levels to this tower, but the ceiling opens up further along. The plants that need direct rays are basking there. 

She doesn’t call for him, so he stops to examine a leaf. It’s a little thing, he doesn’t recognize it. But… He wonders what else grows here. 

“Oi, mad man.” It’s near enough his name, so he turns when called. “You theivin’?” The Dag looks how he remembers. 

Silver-white hair tied into a long braid that drops down her back. Skin a warmer color since Furiosa’s stand, ever since she’s been free of the vault. But the bridge of her nose still blushes pink with burn. 

“No theivin,” he promises. 

“Good. There’s plenty for you lot in the kitchens, I won’t have you pickin on defenseless seedlings.” Her hips dip to the side and she looks behind her. “You aren’t playing shy, are you now?” 

Max finds himself looking down into the scowling face of a miniature Dag. Her seedling. He remembers how her mother had cooed into her swaddling when she was still tiny. If you didn’t know better you wouldn’t know there were any Joe in her. Maybe there isn’t. The Dag had once said, arms tight around a wiggling toddler, “Maybe she burst right from my forehead—pop!”

“Lo little Nettle.”

He knows her name but she isn’t swayed, instead staring up at her mother. The sun is bright so she squints her eyes. Makes her look like she’s scowling even more. 

“You remember ol drifter Max,” The Dag chides, shifting the basket on her hip. “Last he was here, he tossed you in the air like you were a wee sack of grain.” 

It wasn’t so long ago, but children are fickle—they grow fast and sometimes take warming to. If she remembers, she doesn’t show it. But she does look at him with all the renewed respect a small child can muster. “Will you toss me up again?” 

Dag’s smile is crooked, which he takes as permission as he nods. “Mmhm.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.” 

“ _We_ still have work to do. Flying later.” The Dag rearranges her arms, gestures for Nettle to follow. “You too mad man,” she calls over her shoulder and he follows too. 

They’ve done well since the Citadel fell and Water Town grew, and The Dag has taken to her new role better than most. There was a learning curve, but the surviving Vuvalini and the remains of Joe’s people knew how to coax the seeds from their shells. Then knew how to take old plant matter and recycle it, breathe life back into dead dirt. 

They rely on trade but water is a weighty bargaining chip. There are others working, examining the sproutlings being monitored in the hydroponic systems. Some of those working must come from what they once called the wretched. Now he supposes they’re just people. Others are grown pups, their tattoos shine in the sun, but many have additional lines, crossing out and recreating the lines inscribed. 

The Dag is snipping off heavy leafy greens and Max’s mouth waters, so used to dried grain and the occasional desert meat (now usually cooked). He forgets what vegetation tastes like. Nice, dark and bitter maybe. She doesn’t give him a direct task so he follows Nettle, whose small hands feel for dirt that is too parched. 

A dark green leafy sort of bush catches his attention. “What’s this?” 

Nettle gives it thought, but ultimately yells, “Mum! What’s this one?” She’s too short to see her mother in the next row, so Max’s fingers clench under her arm pits, lift her so she can sit on his shoulder. She likes it, her little hand gripping his hair for purchase.

“Fruit.” Dag grins at them. “Don’t drop my fruit, but that there’s fruit too.” 

“Can I have some leaves?” 

“Why? Know what it is?”

“Maybe.” 

“It’s grown a full cycle, but a lot of those need a season and a half before they start to bare.”

“Won’t harm the plant none.”

“Better not. Go on then.” 

Max plucks a handful, moving down the line so not to take too many from one bunch. Nettle watches and pulls on his ear when she thinks he has taken too many. “I brought seeds.” He says to The Dag after a moment. 

“You know what they are?” 

“Fruit.” Seeds are precious. It’s been so long since green coated their world that they’ve forgotten the names. But he thinks he recognizes these pointy leaves from a house from long ago. Dark fruit that stained the lips of a curly haired woman. 

Seeds are a good gift, but The Dag laughs. “Yeah you’ve certainly given someone fruit.”

He doesn’t immediately respond, but he doesn’t have to. Nettle leans her head forward, her mouth beside his ear. 

“Mum means you gave Furosa a lil one—like me.” She says Furiosa like it’s 3 syllables and while he can’t see her, he can already imagine the small scowl, “Littler than me.” 

“True,” he mutters, but his mind is elsewhere. He’s been caught up in his own thoughts since his return. Furiosa couldn’t hide her condition from her people—nor does he think she would want to. If they all know, then Cheedo knows and... He’s been thoroughly distracted. Now he remembers how strange she’d acted, how hard it had been to draw her from her shell. 

He must say her name out loud because Dag nods from across of the row of green. 

“Cheedo told us you were here.” 

“And she is…?” He’s at a loss. There are things he remembers and things he does not. 

“Angry?” Dag says it like a statement and laughs, which for her, doesn’t give away much. Her dark humor has cooled since Joe’s reign, but she still enjoys running him in circles.

“Is she?” 

“She’s not mad about the baby.” Her fingers find another stem and snips it. “Many of us know what it takes to raise our girls—it takes _many_ , not just the two that made them.” 

She doesn’t elaborate more, which may be a kindness. He doesn’t much need Nettle chirping too much.

Cheedo is angry because she thinks he will leave. Which isn’t unfounded. Considering… he isn’t meant to stay. He’s never been meant to stay. Furiosa found her patch of redemption out on the Fury Road. Max’s is… He isn’t sure. 

The Dag doesn’t seem to expect a decision from him now, which is just fine. In fact, she’s practically ignoring him. Humming as her hands push into dirt. 

“I’ll bring the seeds later.” He isn’t usually one to fill a silence, but being here in this town they built brings him back in pieces. 

“We make our own seeds now,” Nettle whispers, conspiratorially in his ear. 

The Dag says, “That’s not quite how it—” just as he says, “Oh?”

“Mum, the Queen, let’s show him the Queen!” 

“They help, but,” The Dag’s doubtlessly good explanation is steamrolled.  


“The Queen, the Queen!” 

“We’ll show him the queen after we’re finished here.” She gives in with a sigh and a rue smile. The Dag, Max thinks, makes quite a good mother. 

They work steadily and later once they’ve finished, Nettle drags him by the hand away from the rows of green. It’s quieter over here and she stops abruptly, gesturing forward. It seems they’ve arrived. 

The Queen appears to be a box. Which probably isn’t right. As they move closer he hears it. 

“Bees.”

“Bzzz.” Nettle corrects, and The Dag nods her assent. Bzzz they are. 

“Worth as much as water they are. More than maybe.” Dag clucks her tongue in contemplation. “You keep using them. Can’t plant without them and expect to keep at it.” 

Max watches with curiosity as Nettle scurries forward. She has no fear on her face as she draws back a board revealing wiring. And lots and lots of bees. 

“Come on Max,” she chirps, and he nearly looks around for Sproglet, they sound so similar. 

Settled by her side Max peers in. So many things crawling should seem vile. If you see life out in the wastes you only find vermin. These swarm and crawl but they seem… different. 

“They’re fat,” he remarks and feels warm when he hears Nettle giggle. A few crawl along the outside of the box, but Nettle lets one crawl on her hand with solemn eyes for one so small. 

“Innit?” She murmurs before raising her hand to point with. “There she is. There’s Queen. She’s the fattest,” she tells him with a grin. 

Queen is the largest insect he can see (‘Insec’ Nettle says) as she explains in her own way what they do and how they do it. She speaks in reverent quiet tones as another bzzzing bee crawls across the back of her arm. 

“She’s all their mums. It’s very hard work being Queen.” Nettle’s mum laughs as she settles to listen. Nettle’s voice is so insistent Max finds he doesn’t have to say much, but she’ll pause when she wants him to grunt his agreement. 

“She sits up top while the others go to work. They pol-in-ate. They go far off to the plants.” Her small body twists to point towards the sea of green they’ve left behind. “Sometimes we even take them to the other towers so they can pol-in-ate over there. But they always come back.” 

She pauses, waiting for his, “hmm.” He gives it when he notices. 

“They always know the way home—it’s in their little bzzz brains.” 

This time Max licks his bottom lip, thinking about Cheedo’s hard gaze, the Dag’s offhand comment. How Furiosa had nothing to say on the matter and he doesn’t think she will. She knows what it’s like. 

Nettle too, in her little sproglet brain knows enough. 

“Right,” he says, as The Dag stands up. 

“Let’s crack open just a bit of comb.” Her smile is surprisingly kind, before her brows furrow comically. “Then back to work—ALL of us.”


	5. Chapter 5

Max hasn’t come to bother her at all. It’s a surprise. While the idea of him padding behind her, watching her movements for weakness like one of the sisters or the oddly attentive boys is annoying, she may have enjoyed bickering with him. 

The garages should be cool, set deep in the stone as they are, but the roar of engines and many mechanics makes the air heavy with the smell of work. 

When her hand lifts to swipe sweat from her brow it takes grease with it. 

“Axel,” she calls and grimaces. She needs a glass of water. Axel bounds over, all prepubescent limbs and personality. He was an older pup when they took the Citadel—now he’s all limbs and like the rest of his litter, very eager to please. 

Toast calls them Lost Boys, though agrees they aren’t very lost any more. Capable says Lost Pups with a smile that often seems too faint. Furiosa thinks Found Pups too bulky and wonders why they won’t just refer to them as mechanics, farmers, cooks, and whatever else. 

“General.” Internally she still cringes whenever they call her that. Though she supposes it’s true. She is their general, while the sisters serve as a counsel to guide them. 

No one can deny the former Citadel residents need a firm moral education. 

“Where’s Max?” 

“Spit said he’s gone up to the towers.” She doesn’t like the way the boy’s eyes look at her knowingly. Knows for a fact that all her charges watch with curiosity when her wanderer— _the wanderer_ —comes looking. Especially after her stomach grew. 

“Are you going to show him then?” 

‘Now’s a good enough time. You did good work.”

The boy’s eyes alight. They may be odd, and have ingrained mantras that were—and are—hell to break, but, she trusts them to do good work. 

She leaves with Axel with “orders” that he take a break, then he can… She should remember the new projects, but she feels heavy and tired. Her afternoon diversion, while pleasant, has made her sleepy.

 _Sleepy_ is not something Furiosa allows herself to be. 

She takes the lift. Unknowingly traces Max’s earlier steps, though she doesn’t step in the footprints left by the phantom child. The air grows warmer as she reaches the nursery. Wet and warm, but not so uncomfortable. Instead of grease, the air here smells… green. 

She had been up to the domes and the terraces on occasion when she was The Immortan’s Imperator. While the area hasn’t changed drastically, those tending the sproutlings look healthier. Their faces have a fullness and it shows in the way they move and work. 

Spade, who wasn’t originally called Spade, has a broom in his hand as he walks past. “He’s over there, with The Dag and her pup.” 

She hears them before she sees them. Rather, she hears Nettle first. She’s laughing. Nettle is a serious girl, though her laughter isn’t unusual it is boisterous now. Her mother is sitting and watching, bent forward with her arms resting on her spread knees. She’s grinning, and when she spies Furiosa her eyebrows go up. And waggle. 

Max doesn’t turn to look at her—though certainly he knows she’s there. His feet are spread apart, anchoring himself as Nettle wraps her arms around his braceless leg, hanging on tight. Every step he takes is careful and exaggerated as he drags her along with him. 

Whatever game they’re playing he seems to be losing, and with a great sigh he falls backwards. Comical, scripted, he’s sure not to crush the child in his exaggerated fall, though his playmate doesn’t seem to notice. 

As his body collapses in the dust, Nettle unwraps herself, crawls up to place a small hand over his chest. She sits on him, rather daintily Furiosa thinks looking at her crossed legs. 

“Now you have to collect the comb! Even if you’re ‘fraid of the bzzbees.”

It’s unlikely that Max is the sort to be afraid of a few honey bees, but he looks at her with wounded eyes. 

“Max can square off against the bzzbees later,” The Dag interrupts and Nettles looks around, spies the newest addition in an instant. She scampers off Max and is on her quickly, though much more gently. 

Little hands find her stomach. Furiosa is certain that Nettle is the only one in the whole settlement who would touch her stomach without asking—and nearly all wouldn’t ask. “Furosa,” she pronounces her name with two syllables, “I showed Max the bzz. He aint so bad at plantin either.” 

It’s obvious that Max is significantly easier to say than _Furiosa._

She can feel his eyes on her and she isn’t sure why her face heats. Hopefully it’s not noticeable. “That’s very good. May I borrow him?” 

A bit stilted, but the Imperator Furiosa had no reason to interact with children in a close capacity, nor does she remember much of Joe’s other heirs. Pre Imperator Furiosa doesn’t remember the other children of The Green Place, and she had been a child then too. Surely that made it easier. 

Nettle isn’t put off, instead weighing her options before sighing. “Ok. But bring him back later.”

“I’m sure you’ll find him,” Furiosa says quite seriously, and is startled when she hears The Dag laugh. 

“Alright then. How about yous and me find something to eat?” She catches her daughter’s hand, but throws Max a look as she leaves, which he returns. 

Which is curious. She’s used to being the one in his head. As much as one can be. He’s still on the ground, though he’s pulled himself up into a sit. Dirty. But not the dust and dirt of the roads. A little red in the face from being pummeled by a knee-high girl, but he looks very much alive, perhaps how he looked on the Fury Road, or that time with the bandits, or—

Hm. Heat pulls in her belly. She usually has more control. 

“Come on then,” she calls and he pulls himself into a stand. After a beat she says, “You’re good with them.”

“Hm?” His broad hands are patting over his body, apparently checking to make sure nothing’s displaced. Mollified he looks up, confusion written. 

“Them. Children.”

He grunts and she supposes that’s agreement. “Some.” 

She beckons for him to follow and he does. Looks over him from the corner of her eye. Same jacket, different shirt than she remembers. She wonders where he got it, or perhaps whose body he picked it off of. “How’s the brace?” It doesn’t seem to be giving him much trouble. 

“Good. Tweaked it on the road. You are too, you know.’ 

“Excuse me?”

“Kids. Nettle.” His hand reaches out in front of him, palm flat at about the girl’s height, as if she may have forgotten who Nettle is. “You’re good.” 

Furiosa doesn’t laugh. The quick punch of air from her nose isn’t a laugh, but it’s mirthful. 

“She respects me as an authority figure in her life, and admittedly she had taken quite a shine to this one.” Her hand finds her belly as she shrugs. 

Water Town, once The Citadel, was in chaos after she ripped the jaw from the old Immortan. But not only chaos in a violent way. They were welcomed well enough, but how to keep the operation moving… was a good question. Would the pop up rulers at Gas Town and the Bullet Farm still defer to the new governing body of the Citadel? 

Furiosa was a warrior, an Imperator, a general. But she was not a war lord. On matters concerning the day-to-day? She left that to the council of the sisters. She operates best as an authority figure.

Capable’s compassion, Toast’s knowledge, Cheedo’s caution, The Dag’s unique way of looking at things. She trusts the sisters nearly as much as she trusts herself. 

“They like it,” Max says, interrupting her thoughts. “Kids. Like it when you talk to them like they’re grown. Makes um feel important.” 

“That why you like it when I talk at you?” It’s meant to be teasing, but then she glances to her side. “ _What_ are you eating?” 

No response, but he looks sheepish when his hand opens. Some toasted nuts and dried grain. “Nettle’s.”

“You took Nettle’s snacks?”

“I… assure you,” the word creaks like an old wheel, “she said she had plenty.” 

Max always eats like a stray dog when there’s food in front of him. Has he been down to the kitchens yet, or has he just been evading The Dag’s watchful eye and stealing the occasional leafy green and snack? Maybe he’s only employed by the real thief. 

“No thieving involved. All given willingly.” Maybe he can read her mind. 

“Mmhm. Do you want to stop by the kitchens?” 

A hard choice. He’s torn, but he shakes his head. “No. Want to see what you fetched me for.” He skips a beat, crunches on another nut. “Then kitchens.” 

“I thought so. Come on, it’s down below in the shops.’

“We’ll take the lift?” 

“Yes,” she sighs. “We’ll take the lift.” 

xxx

As they travel, Furiosa begins to notice how many eyes are on her. She usually has eyes on her, as a leader it’s to be expected, and once her pregnancy grew she accepted the renewed glances. 

Now though, eyes bounce from her to Max, though he doesn’t seem to mind. Or care, she notes as he crunches on a few oats. 

It’s Dowel who bounds up to them, the boy Cheedo sent to fetch her when Max arrived. He’s an excitable pup. He says he was up on the dais with Corpus Colossus when they road in with the Immorton’s body. Says proudly that he was one who helped pull the lever. 

Work is divided up on a need to need basis, but many of the villagers grow into a calling. Whether it’s planting, engine work, or finding new and creative ways to blend their finite harvests into unique meals—which is one of the harder tasks. 

Dowel and many of the smaller boys, prior war pups and not, bounce from job to job. Currently she thinks he’s taken a shine to Cheedo, but he also likes following around—

“Toast wants you to come look at something.”

“That’s fine. We’re going down to the garages anyway. Run up ahead and tell her I’m coming.”

Before he leaves he shoots Max a look, grins wide and turns on his heel. 

“He, uh,” Max gestures with his free hand towards his eyes and head. Where Dowel is painted with grease. “For you?”

It takes her a moment to catch onto his meaning. “Yeah, I guess. It used to be a mark of status. Now they paint themselves however they like.”

What Max thinks of that he doesn’t say beyond a contemplative hum, so she continues moving. 

Some of the pups have taken to using the red sands as a dye rub. Apparently it was Toast who thought of that. She likes to pour over old books in the evenings when the work is done. If she hadn’t become so enamored with grease, gunpowder, and welded metal, Furiosa wouldn’t have been surprised had she pledged herself as a history woman. 

Toast isn’t hard to find, bent over her latest puzzle in a shower of sparks and a cacophony of slamming metal. She likes speed, but she also likes power, and the hunk of metal she’s pouring herself into reflects that. 

Slim chassis, but it sits high on good, large wheels. Not the fastest, but you wouldn’t be thrown from a snag on the road driving that—or even going over a man. 

Max whistles, dry and unused, but it gets Toast’s attention after another shower of sparks. 

“Furiosa,” she greets, then her eyes narrow and she grins, “Max.”

Toast leans back, wipes her forehead with the back of her heavy gloves. “I wanted you to have a look at this before I started welding it in place.”

“Looks like you’ve already started welding.”

“Not that bit, the other bit.”

Before she can move, Max is inching forward, peering into the car’s metal maw while Toast looks on with a grin. 

“Or I could borrow him.” 

“Already been borrowed.” Max supplies helpfully. “From The Dag.”

“Ooh, she’ll put you to work.” Furiosa has her doubts that Toast won’t also put him to work, but now she’s looking to her, maybe for permission. Toast is well aware of what she has to share with him. 

It’s a good gift. 

“Have fun, I’ll make sure things are in order before the rest of the mechs go to dinner.” 

Toast gives her a knowing look, but Max’s head darts up. Eyes suspicious. That’s alright, she thinks. “I’ll come,” he says, but she’s already nodding and walking away. 

“Come on, look at these spark plugs,” Toast says. “I need her to SPRING to a start, not grumble and spit.”

Max is grumbling now, but it’s not heart felt. She leaves them to it.


	6. Chapter 6

Toast looks alive. Max remembers the first good look he had at her. When he’d gone after Furiosa, constantly tilting between offensive and defensive until it was just fighting. 

She’d been closest when the girls grabbed at his chain. He still remembers the whites of her eyes when he’d lunged back, all bark, only some bite. 

He doesn’t remember much after that if he’s honest. All adrenaline and too little holding him together. Too hungry, thirsty, and mad if he’s truly honest. 

Toast is good at taking in data and making quick decisions. He wonders how she drives. 

“This here?” He grunts, points at the mess inside, “She’ll overheat. Not right away, but she will.”

Toast’s hands are on her hips, grease smudging against her trousers. He notices suddenly how much of Furiosa he can see in her. She is still Toast, but her shoulders no longer curl forward as she loads shell after shell into the old rig’s assorted guns. 

Furiosa says she isn’t good with children. Toast is not a child, but Max thinks time will prove Furiosa wrong. 

“Ok, show me.” Toast snaps her wrench against the heavy fabric of her gloves with a _twump_ before she hands it over. 

He’d like to see how Toast handles the sand, but he’s also pleased to note she could take care of herself with a cool steel pipe. 

“Here,” he says, pointing with the tool and leaning in for a closer look. 

They work together after that. Max murmurs directions and Toast butts in for clarification. He grunts his approval when he sees some of her other modifications. 

When she asks where he’s been, he shrugs. Waves his hand as if to shoo the question away. So instead she tells him about their town, about Capable’s recent trade agreements, what new nonsense the boys have been up to. How she herself last drove the rig on an oil run. 

“Furiosa gave me her blessing, but you could tell she was mad. Can’t even reach the pedals now.”

He doesn’t mean to laugh, but it’s a rich guttural sound. He keeps his head down as he works. 

“Capable says with her attitude she’ll be back to doing runs as soon as she spits the kid out.” That isn’t as funny, but when Max looks up and sees Toast’s smug smile he realizes he’s being baited. 

Usually when he’s being baited it involves a car chase, the only food for miles, and a strong possibility of being shot. 

“Don’t worry.” He almost argues with her but she cuts him off, “Hospic wouldn’t let her. You remember Hospic don’t you? Dug that arrow out of your gut that time with the bandits.”

He might remember that. 

“She’s taken over as head healer, now that Stitch’s eyes are going. Can’t see what he’s stitching up. Plus, she mothered for Dag when she gave birth.” 

Max wasn’t there for The Dag’s delivery, but he was there later. She’d recovered quickly enough, but she was always a bit of what they used to call an odd bird. Now all birds are odd. 

Toast is the one who asks the question they all want to ask. For no other reason than she wants to know. “Won’t be too long now. You sticking around for the fireworks?” 

Dirt trails and lost time are what he knows. Water Town grows too close a comfort too quickly, too fast. It’s the comfort that’s the problem.

“Wouldn’t be harm in it.” He manages noncommittally. 

It’s enough for Toast, “Well. It’s a start.”

She’s baiting him again and invisible hackles rise, like an impossible pull in his guts. There’s no harm, except there could be. He needs to—

“She hasn’t come up with names yet,” Toast says nonchalantly. She’s good at baiting, as well as retreating. Ducking and weaving. 

“Mm.”

“Bad luck to wait,” she says it like she knows it. 

“Is it?”

“Some say.” 

He weighs the pros and cons of asking his next question. Eventually decides to ask, slowly, “So. Your name.” His hand bobs to accompany his words, “Toast?” 

Pros: Her laughter is sharp and she doesn’t seem offended. “I miss Toast. We have it sometimes, but the bread is tough. Not the same.” Her eyes seem to glaze for just a moment. “Toast so warm the butter melts right into it. So much it pools on top.” 

Max remembers butter, and his mouth grows warm. Salivates at the thought. Toast, he thinks, is a good thing to remember. 

“Your parents?” A more dangerous question, but she doesn’t seem angry. Just quirks her lips. 

“My parents didn’t name me Toast. Sometimes we change out here. For better or for worse.” That makes sense. But, here comes the…

Cons: “What about you?” she asks. “‘Max.’ That’s an old name.”

When he doesn’t say anything she purses her lips. It’s easy to translate. _I shared mine. You share yours._ Which is a contract he didn’t sign, but he supposes his comings and goings have signed him something. They would never force him, but every time he comes around they find a way to chisel away at his stone. 

“My parents.”

“Did you have siblings?” At his look she scoffs, “Fine.” Then quieter, more matter of fact. “I had a brother. Older than me. War fodder.”

She gives, so maybe he must. Not must, but should. It was so long ago that sometimes he forgets what it was like. When the green was plenty and coated the earth. When there were sirens and audios and close calls. The people they lost in the close calls. 

When the world was only broken, not yet dead. 

“I had… siblings. Younger ones.” And others, he thinks. A woman with curled hair, a small one who never grew to call him Da. The one who did.

She isn’t there when he looks for her. Sproglet is nowhere to be found. He ponders this as Toast gets his attention. She seems to have noticed his wandering eye. 

“Ask her about it. The names, eh? It’s bad luck to wait—some say.” When he snorts she shakes her head. “What? You don’t think she’ll talk to you?” 

That isn’t quite right, but if he looks sheepish he doesn’t mean to. 

“She trusts your input.”

“In a fight,” he grumbles. 

“Children are just as, if not worse, than fighting. I don’t know how Dag does it.” 

“She’s hers,” Max says, and he’s not talking about The Dag. Toast gives him pause, and his eyes, which usually wander, are locked on her. 

“She doesn’t have to be just hers.” 

“I’m not…” he struggles for the word, “capable of—“

“No, your hair’s not red. Listen, just open your mouth. Sometimes you have something good to say.” Before he can argue or even begin to decide whether or not he should be offended, Toast drops the hood of the car, just missing his fingers. “Come on, take a look at the suspension before you’re unborrowed.” 

xxx 

When Furiosa returns both Max and Toast are under the jacked car. Their boots poke out and she can hear them muttering. Toast’s questions and descriptions and the soft rumble of Max’s observations. 

“Hey,” she announces, so not to spook them as she taps her boot against his. 

Both voices pause and Toast speaks up, voice muffled by the pile of steel between them. “Up in a mo’.”

Curiosity won’t get her under that vehicle, even though it itches. Her belly won’t let her. Even if they jacked the car up further, there’s no way she’ll allow herself to lay flat on one of the creepers, any passing pup or greaser ready to watch her try and struggle upright—or Max and Toast for that matter. 

When the two slide out she has to stifle her laughter. Both are covered in an attractive mixture of sweat and grease. Toast has absently wiped a large swipe of the stuff along her brow. In another life she may have made a fine Imperator. Perhaps now she can make a different kind of Imperator. 

Any cleanliness Max achieved earlier in the day has been vanished in a puff of axel grease. But his eyes look alive and they stay trained on her until she breaks eye contact. “May I?” She asks with faux politeness as Max watches in interest. 

“I suppose,” Toast allows, “but send him down again if you want him out of your hair.”

She doesn’t bother too long with that comment. “You’ll have to fight with the gardeners for him. Or maybe Capable will have him sort her things—she knows he can read.” She wouldn’t put it past them. Maybe Max will learn to press paper with Cheedo or Hospic will start sending him on runs. 

“This is more fun,” Toast sighs but Max doesn’t seem to agree or disagree, just watches their argument with calm affection. In the many times he’s found his way back to them, he’s taken on many jobs. Although, not at first. The first time Max came back they were surprised, the sisters excited to show him what they had accomplished. 

But Max was quiet. Quieter than when he left them. He followed and watched with solemn eyes. She still doesn’t know where he slept that first night. Maybe in his car or maybe out along the rocks. Maybe he didn’t sleep at all. 

(It took many days for Max to sleep in her bed. Although once he had, he never slept anywhere else during his stays.)

Since then, she’s had many days and nights to consider that first visit. She thinks he was so silent, watched so keenly, because he wasn’t sure he wasn’t seeing ghosts. 

He didn’t stay long that time. Though he began to warm near the end, but never without the strange look in his eyes. Perplexed. Torn. He left and they couldn’t be sure he’d return. 

He did. And since then he takes on odd jobs. Originally keeping his few interactions to herself and the sisters. Eventually bending to listen to pup stories or to nod obligingly to questioning townsfolk who have grown used to their community living. 

She remembers the first time she came upon Max, seated in one of the newly traded junk rides with children, former pups and boys and girls of the wretched, wedged in with him as he dictated in low but amiable tones how to hotwire a car. 

The children were easier for him, they wear their hopes on their sleeves. It’s the adults where he falters, as if he can’t bring himself to trust them at face value. 

She feels heavy when she gestures for him to follow, bids goodbye to Toast. If she were half as equipped to deal with the children, then the future would be easier. 

It’s a testament to his trust that he doesn’t ask where they’re going, but that doesn’t stop him from being curious. From the corner of her eye she can see how his eyes flick to watch her, then to the floor, then to the ceiling. “Been busy?” he asks instead.

I was checking in that the greasers didn’t destroy the rig. It needs new breaks.”

“Don’t trust them?”

“I like to take care of the rig myself.” It’s not just a rig, or one of the rigs. It’s The Rig. Perhaps it’s sentimental, but when the forfeited war boys dragged it back in pieces after the events on Fury Road for scrap—well, she’d pieced it back together. It looks different now, as it should, but it’s still the same chassis that took them away, then drove them home. 

He nods. She thinks he understands. 

“You’re filthy,” she turns the conversation away. Talk like that is too close to her… for lack of a better word, surprise. 

“Not as filthy as we were earlier,” he says with a straight face, but his eyebrow tilts and she laughs. It’s more of a bark than a laugh, but a laugh all the same. Her hand swipes out to cuff his shoulder and she thinks he looks rather pleased with himself. 

They’re quiet as she leads him through the tunnels and other work rooms. Most of the mechs and greasers have moved up for dinner. She can see Axel still working on his ride, but his eyes watch them as they pass. He’s worked personally on her side project. 

She waves hello as Max watches. But then she stops him, hand on his arm as she pulls him towards the corner of the large work cavern. “Here.”

And then she waits. 

It’s a V8 Interceptor. Sort of. At least the shell of one. Max had mentioned his car in passing, but when she looked through Capable’s logs she found no mention of an Interceptor salvaged from the wreckage out on the wastes. 

“I’m not sure it’s the same one. We found it at a trading post after it was trashed by its rider. Wouldn’t have recognized it if its hull wasn’t in shape.” She steps forward, walks a half circle around it, gestures with her metal hand. “The whole back end had to be pounded out. Some pieces remade.” 

Max is still quiet. When she looks, his eyes are glued to the metal. He notices her looking but his eyes duck down as sets forward to get a closer look. 

Sanded down, the metal isn’t smooth to the touch, but his fingers spread reverently over it. He walks a full circle around it, passing her. 

“It’s the same.” 

“I thought it might be. Must have gotten picked up by scavengers.”

“Is it mine?” His question is so similar to one asked earlier that she nearly laughs. But it’s a good question. 

Rules of ownership are muddled in Water Town. In a society where everything was once owned by a despot, how do you go about splitting capital? When Furisoa was an Imperator, her ride, her arm, the clothes on her back, and truly, even herself was Joe’s to do with as he pleased. 

So who owns the pumps? The precious water? Is it her, or the sisters and their council? The town itself? The vehicles littering the garage and making up their defenses technically belong to the town at large. Truly it may not be hers to give. But she thinks that many would agree that there’s not enough they can do for him, the heart of their coup. 

Who doesn’t remember him? Standing atop the Giga Horse. Furiosa’s right hand. 

“Yes,” she watches the small subtle changes in the lines of his eyes, the crease of his mouth. “Its insides are a mess and need work. I wouldn’t take it out just yet.”

It’s his to do with as he wants. Leave it behind or fix it and leave. Furiosa doesn’t believe she owes him anything. What they accomplished out on the road was mutual. What they gave each other (a catch by the foot, a pint of blood) they gave freely. But she is grateful. 

“Most modifications we’ve made have been cosmetic. The engine screeches like a banshee. It probably—” he breaks her off by moving forward. She nearly expects him to kiss her again, but his forehead finds hers. Fingers tentatively reaching up to brush at the back of her neck. 

It’s nearly the right placement, and she smiles into the small space between their noses. Her fingers rise up to fall into place on his neck, and his shift to match hers. 

He doesn’t say thank you, but she thinks he doesn’t need to. 

“Well, do you want to see what’s in her?” She wonders if Axel is still at his post, not far away. She finds she doesn’t care. 

“No,” he murmurs, eyes open to look at her, “I’d like to eat.” 

“Me too,” she says, his hand a nice weight on her neck as she breathes. 

xxx 

The kitchens are quiet when they make their way there. They’ve missed the evening rush. Which is good, because otherwise she’s certain Max would get looks with how voraciously he eats. 

It’ll take a few days for him to get used to the abundance of the town, compared to the road. The food is simple. It must be when you’re feeding so many. But food also tastes better when there aren’t those starving just mere miles away at the base of the rock. 

Tonight’s lentils and potatoes taste better than anything she ever ate as an Imperator. Some of the Mothers warned she would crave the oddest things. Furiosa expects she’s lucky that she knows so little to crave.

The oddest thing she’s eaten was a raw potato. The starchy, chalky texture that would normally be revolting was oddly appetizing. She tells Max and isn’t let down when he shrugs his shoulders. Says, “Food is food.” 

“Sometimes I miss meat.” She admits. 

“Weren’t there—” He hasn’t stopped devouring his third plate, so she waits for him to catch air. A grunt. He swallows. His hand raises to bob, mimicking a, “goat.” 

There had been goats, up on the stone ridges. But, “They died. Disease we guess. I wouldn’t have eaten them anyway.” Joe used to butcher them on occasion. Usually the kids or big ones if they were growing old. But that was to fill one man’s belly. 

Max looks contemplative, but finally just jabs a finger at her half empty bowl. 

“Want it?” she asks. 

He shakes his head. “No. You should.” She’s hungry, but with little appetite, and only the knowledge that Capable would say the same with a critically raised eyebrow keeps her from snapping at him. 

A comfortable silence falls over their table and once they’ve both returned their dishes, she expects he’ll return with her to her rooms. “A few things to do,” he mumbles with a jerk of his head. “Won’t be long.” What tasks he’s accumulated in his short return she doesn’t know, but she’ll either get the story out of him after or hear about it tomorrow. 

Besides, she has her evening ritual too look forward to. A calming half hour spent cleaning the sand out of her arm joints, running an oiled rag over it to clean the metal. 

Later, she’s halfway through her ministrations when the metal of her door creaks open. 

“What did you promise Nettle?” She doesn’t look over her shoulder. 

Max responds by stepping forward and placing a tall metal canister on the stone of her bench. It’s hot which doesn’t bother the stone none, and she can feel the heat radiate in the cool room. He’s quiet, like he expects her to know what it is.

“Max?” 

“Mm.”

“What is that?” She turns to look and his eyebrows furrow as if the word evades his dust beaten brain. Used to scant desert meat and the occasional bramble for sustenance. 

“Tea?” He looks like he wants to add something, brow creased and eyes clouded.

“Ok. Thank you. Why?” Tea is a luxury plant, it doesn’t fill bellies like beans and potatoes. Doesn’t revitalize them like dark collards. 

“It’s good for,” a vague hand gesture towards her person. 

Good for pregnancy. A nice thought, but exasperation creeps up. “And you would know…?” 

“My wife’s mother—” he starts then stops, and she holds her breath as he works over the thought, like a piston burning through rust. 

He starts again, “They were planted behind my wife’s mother’s house. She swore by it, and… our son’s birth was easy.” 

_I’m sorry_ doesn’t mean anything. Many people can be sorry for the death of Mary Jo Bassa, but no amount of platitudes will return KT Concannon and the other mothers. The Green Place. No one said sorry when she stepped into the desert to mourn her newest loss. Not The Valkyrie, not The Sisters, not Max. 

The wound is open and it needs to breathe. 

“Were there others?” Children. 

“Yes.” 

Sorry won’t fix it, so Furiosa does what she can. Picks up the canister and opens it. Sniffs it. “You’re sure you won’t poison me?” 

“Sure,” he grunts, though his eyes clear. An odd look. As if he’s surprised the world hasn’t fallen down around him. She knows that feeling well. “I tried it earlier,” he continues. “No poison.”

“You tried it? When did you find time to make tea?” 

“I didn’t. I,” a soft curve to his lip, “I ate it.”

“You ate it?” 

“Mmhm.” 

“Well then.” She tips the cannister and drinks. It doesn’t taste bad. It tastes green. With a bit of sweet. A sliver of honey comb from the kitchens no doubt. 

It’s warm, which is pleasing in her cool rooms. He doesn’t take any when offered, until she points out that unless he wants to be woken up hourly because of her pregnant bladder, he should take some. 

“If I have to drink it, you may as well have to too. Or eat it,” she adds. 

Her argument is sound, and they dip into a companionable silence as he leans forward to pluck up the cannister, takes a small sip. 

Silence is as warm as the tea, but as they work through the remaining liquid she finds herself talking about The Green Place. “I don’t remember much,” she says, “but it was green and there was always enough to eat.” She talks more of her mother, who never claimed a father for her. Not unusual for the Vuvalini. She speaks of KT Concannon, and the lessons she taught. The stars she knew. 

When she stops between thoughts, Max chimes in. More uncertain than her, a soft rumble to his words. The fruits of the bushes the tea came from would stain your hands and lips bright red, he remembers faintly. 

He doesn’t name his family, but she does not push him. Instead grins as he remembers how hot the summers would get, before he came to know how hot the world would burn. 

Afterwards they sleep.


	7. Chapter 7

Max stands on the sands surrounding the Citadel—no, Water Town. The sands are white, blinding to the eye. In the distance he can see the rock towers, tipped with green. An oasis in a sea of rot.

No car, he must have walked. Why? He isn’t sure. But the sun doesn’t burn so badly yet. 

“Max,” she says. “This isn’t right.” Sproglet sighs beside him, looking off into the distance too. 

Guts twist at her words. Was she always there? Well, he supposes, she always is. She’s right, isn’t she?

“No. THIS isn’t right,” she insists, skin white and clammy, eyes vivid like what he remembers of pond scum. 

The towers kissed with green bloom with smoke. Pinpoints of red in the distance. 

“Max,” she insists. She’s burning too, starts with a fizzle at the end of her lank hair, her eyes are on fire. “Da!”

Everyone screams now, clanging in his skull. Sproglet, her mum, countless others he may not have killed by his hand, but whom he watched burn with the cool gaze a road warrior must fashion. 

Ash fills his mouth and he’s burning too, raises his arm to bat it away—to— 

His arm is in an iron grip, his body twists as his eyes snap open into Furiosa’s. The room is burning and he waits for her to crackle into flames. Heart beats mark the passage of time, what had she said? All those days ago?  
_It’s ok. Sleep. Get some rest._

Memory whispers in the silent room and he’s nearly convinced he’s there in the rig again, before his eyes duck down her body. He jerks so violently she has to twist to keep his arm in her grip. 

“No,” she orders. Commands with an authority that comes natural. 

He _means_ to say no, to argue, but the words are choked up, a grunt as he tries to pull himself away from her pallet. 

“No,” she repeats, eyes stony. “You’re staying here tonight.” 

He fights for words, only manages, “I could have—”

“No. Lie down.” She repeats herself like a teacher, a leader, a mother maybe. Warily he lays beside her. Too aware of his arms, his legs, the harm they could do. 

Sighing she releases his wrist. Instead wraps her hand around his neck, a warm solid weight. Her forehead finds his in the dim and he breathes through his nose as his body thrums. Minutes pass and he doesn’t relax. 

“Sleep.” She says, “Don’t even think about waiting for me to sleep, then slipping away. You’re sleeping here.” 

Caught he shifts, his own hand finally coming up to rest on her neck. His brain fights to stay awake, to hear her breathing dip into sleep first. But eventually he sleeps. Soundly.  
\---  
In the morning Furiosa wakes early, which wakes Max though he doesn’t move. Drifts back to sleep as she washes, reattaches the simplistic arm. She tires more easily than she is used to, but she has a schedule and didn’t spend the last 200 days sitting on her ass. 

As usual, he’ll spend his first few days sleeping long and eating fast. Then he’ll reach an equilibrium, and then he’ll leave. As has been done in the past. 

He isn’t thinking about that now. Max sleeps soundly for two hours after the rest of the town has begun its many tasks, until the light from the small narrow windows cut into the rock wall of Furiosa’s ceiling crawl across her raised pallet. 

He’s slow to start, washes in Furiosa’s basin as the cold water pumps up. He drinks some too. Knowing the water will drain to be cleaned in the vast filters below doesn’t stop the swirling water from looking like waste. 

Her room is decorated as sparsely as he remembers. A woven blanket still crumped across her bed, another folded into a corner atop a dented metal chest. Simple seems to fit her. The broken watches he brings for Toast, the weather worn pamphlets, advertising things like Sidney or Perth that so interest the sisters don’t interest Furiosa. Not in the same ways. 

More practical items please her. Seed for the town, news from over the powder lakes. Rare bike parts and valuable strings of copper wiring are better. Looking around the two rooms, divided between her sleeping quarters and her sitting space, he can see no practical objects for… an infant. 

No basket, no cloth and pins for nappies. No objects to occupy a growing mind. 

Memory is a hazy thing. He knows he used to be a cop, but sometimes he forgets what a cop was. The after washes over the before. 

But if he remembers hard enough, there are plastic blocks of many colors, cloth made of the plushest material. But that was before all the plastic was melted down, before the wind beat their fabrics into coarse cloth. 

Max is running his fingertips over the stone of Furiosa’s desk when he realizes the hunger he feels doesn’t need to _remain_. It’s funny how one grows accustomed to food, when one has it. He takes the metal canister with him to return to the kitchens, and as he passes through the hallways a small voice calls out. 

“Max!” Nettle waves her hand in the air at him, the red skin of the apple she clutches glints. It’s small, but as the trees grow and strengthen, so will their fruit. 

“’Lo Nettle,” he says. Her other hand drags someone with her, “and Cheedo.”

Cheedo’s look is as guarded as it was the day before. She doesn’t duck her head or hide behind her hair. She stares straight at him until… he ducks _his_ head towards Nettle. 

If the little girl has picked up on her guardian’s behavior she doesn’t comment, just pulls on her hand and bites her small white teeth into apple flesh. 

“Max helped us with plantin.” Her eyes fall to his hands as she says through apple mush. “What’s that?”

“For tea.” The metal glints in the light and he holds it up for her to see. 

“Mum calls tea leaf juice. I thought you just liked to eat um.”

If he didn’t know why Cheedo was so guarded, he’d enjoy the confused look on her face. Would likely tease her. Not knowing what to do with someone frustrated by him, but not enough to shoot him or blow up his car, is rather novel. He doesn’t know the protocol. 

“Max eats leafs,” Nettle explains for him. “To see if they’re poison. Max says that’s how the old ones used to find medicine. Find what wouldn’t make um drop. I’m going to ask the history man.”

“Maybe Max thinks he’s a history man.” While cool, Cheedo doesn’t sound as cold as she could, and really she just looks at him with mild exasperation. 

Which is good enough. 

“Ain’t got letters.” Another crunch. Nettle looks at the apple, mostly demolished, and hands the remains to him. “Cheedo helps me with MY letters, and Capable with my numbers.”

“Don’t give Max that, I’ll throw it in the compost.”

Nettle shakes her head. “No, Max always finishes,” she says as Max bites into the harder core. 

More exasperation, maybe a smile lingering against Cheedo’s will. 

The apple is tart, but flavor will improve in time. “Nettle, can I um, borrow you later?” Perhaps he should be asking Cheedo, but Nettle looks pleased to be asked. 

“Later I help mum sort the tools.” Her little brow furrows. “You can borrow me then.”

“If Max helps, the work will go faster,” Cheedo chides, hand still around her charge’s. 

The Dag is Nettle’s mum, but Cheedo is also her mum. What had The Dag said?  
_It takes many, not just the two that made them._

Max finishes the core in two more bites, stem and all. Nettle doesn’t look pleased at the idea of more work, but she lets herself be dragged off. 

Alone, Max remembers his task and returns the canister. Breakfast is hot oats. He isn’t sure what’s mixed in from sight alone, but he takes a large bowl, mumbling to the pale teen with tattoos on his fingers. 

It’s chopped and toasted nuts mixed in with creamy oats. Not much seasoning, but after having dust in your mouth for hundreds of days, it tastes like a good dream. It isn’t grainy between your teeth. 

The canteen isn’t full, but a warm buzz of white noise tickles his ears. Different, when you’re so used to the quiet drifts, save for the rumble of your engine and whatever your brain spits out. He’s so lost in his trance he doesn’t notice the other until she’s seated across from him, bowl clattering on the table along with the thump of paper. 

Red hair. 

“Capable,” he says, though it’s nearly unintelligible through his mouthful. 

“Charming,” she drawls, her critical eye softened by the tilt of her lips. “I was wondering when I’d see you. Dag said she would put you on Nettle Watch if she didn’t think you’d teach her to wire the rig.”

After a contemplative silence from both sides she nods, “Though, that could be a useful skill.”

It would be, and as Max chews he thinks about Furiosa’s clever kill switches and his own vehicle, set to blow if the wrong hands fall on it. 

“Maybe you should. You were always good with her, even when she was small.”

It’s not exactly subtle, but Capable’s strength comes from her delivery, cool but empathetic.

If what he told Furiosa didn’t weigh so heavily on his brain, he’d tell all. A man less beaten by the desert would tell all. “Just need to support the head.”

Capable smiles, small and pink as he echoes himself from many days ago. 

When Dag realized he wouldn’t panic and drop the wriggling babe, she’d felt right pleased to drop her in Max’s arms. But she didn’t need to put his arms into a proper configuration. His large calloused hands knew just how to scoop and hold such a fragile body. 

_Just need to support the head_ , he’d said when asked. Capable had laughed then, and Furiosa had been there, he remembers. Shoulders against the wall, eyes clear and mouth tilted. 

Though, he cannot ever remember her holding Nettle. 

Silence falls over the table as Max continues to dig through his second bowl and Capable mixes extra seeds and nuts into her meal with her left hand. Her right flips through the papers at her side. As she works her forehead creases. It’s a quiet moment to watch. Too often he’s pulled out into the center (or onto cars or poles), when really, he’d like to watch. 

Capable screws up her eyes when she’s thinking hard and she dexterously balances eating with her left hand and scribbling notes with a slim piece of graphite in her right. 

“Chickens or goats?” She asks suddenly. 

After a moment of consideration he decides that he has absolutely no idea what the question means. He may not be the best conversationalist, but, he’s fairly certain he’s missing something. 

“Chickens or goats,” Capable repeats, blue eyes darting up to look at him. “For here. Water Town. They say the settlements out west thrived last cycle. They may be bringing the kids and chicks to Trade Row or Barter Town.” 

That makes more sense. Also why she looks so distracted. 

“Doubtlessly for _outrageous_ prices,” she adds while scribbling something else in her margin. “But we’re not like the wells that run the risk of drying up. Water’s good bargain fodder if we can reach an agreement. So, chickens or goats?” 

“When was the last time you saw a chicken?” He asks, wondering when he last saw one. 

“When I was small,” she admits, eyes looking up towards the rock ceiling. “Poor thing laid the tiniest eggs until she didn’t any more. Then we ate her.” 

Max stares at the stone table and Capable’s spoon taps against the rim of her bowl. “Sure they have chickens?” 

“They’re supposed to. And we won’t mistake a chicken for a dog.”

“They have dogs?”

“Don’t know. Some of the traders do, and some of the settlements too. Useful. They bark as soon as they hear an engine. Even a quiet one.”

“Mmhm.”

“You had a dog?”

“I had… dogs.” He says, and Capable eats another spoonful as she nods. 

“So, chicken or goats?”

He thinks about it, remembering the funny but valuable birds and the hardy mountain animal. 

“Chickens,” he says, slow and thoughtful. “Eat pests too. For the…” His hand (and spoon) wave to insinuate the gardens. She picks up on it. 

“What if they start nibbling on the plants?” Capable counters. 

“Goats need more feed.”

“They’re hardier.” 

“Chicks hatch faster than goats grow.”

“Milk?”

“Eggs.” 

Capable sighs, and he has no doubt she’d have argued for chickens had he claimed goats. It’s what makes Capable so suited for her tasks. 

“Both?” He asks, as she scratches another note. 

“I don’t even know who’s going to mind them. No one really knows how. Better not to take on too much.”

A good idea. 

“Both though,” she takes another bite and her eyes look conspiratory. “Do you remember cake?”

It’s such an alien word. “Cake.” 

“I had it once,” she goes on, stirs her oats. “Back when Joe still thought he could woo us. Cheedo wasn’t there yet. Toast didn’t want it, but Angharad knew there was no use in a silent strike. She cut it up into equal pieces and we ate it by the window…” Her eyes look far away, sad, but not so sad. He forgets sometimes that for the others there were many days before the one when she went under the wheels.

Blue eyes framed by red hair blink as she comes back. “It was decadent. We ate by the window like one of Miss Giddy’s socialite tea parties. The ones she’d tell us about.”

“I remember it. Cake.” It comes together in a haze. He remembers white frosting and tacky colored piping, spelling out a name. Maybe his, maybe someone else’s. But for the life of him, he can’t remember what it… “Not what it tastes like. But I remember it.”

“Maybe someday we’ll have both goats and chickens.” 

“Mm.”

“Do you want to go?” He looks up sharply, but she gestures towards her papers. “Not ready for a while yet, but Furiosa can’t go and Toast wouldn’t say know no to backup.”

“Where?”

“Likely Barter Town. It’s bigger and closer.” She must see something in his eyes, because she asks, “You’ve been?”

“Once or twice,” he says diplomatically. 

“You can find anything in Barter Town.”

“That’s true.” You really can find anything in Barter Town. 

“It’s not so many days a drive. But they’ll be there for at least a weak to make the deals.” Her head ducks as she adds another number to her sheet. “Will you still be around?”

Ah, this again. Capable plays it off with a relaxed air, but to him, she’s no more subtle than her sisters. 

“Maybe,” he grunts, going back to his breakfast as Capable smiles to herself, graphite scratching.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can be hit up on [Tumblr!](http://pieribee.tumblr.com/)


	8. Chapter 8

When Furiosa takes lunch, Max is nowhere in sight. She eats with Hestia, a former milk mother who’s proven to be adept at both crossbows and bullet sealing. She has a full, warm face and a biting humor that bellies her care. 

Though Furiosa can’t fathom why the woman thinks she’ll be any more receptive to her questions the fifth time. 

“I feel perfectly fine.” Furiosa doesn’t snap. Or, only a little. 

“Not even your heels? My heels were so swollen when I was as big as you.”

She’s being teased, Furiosa realizes with a bit of shock. It feels like the last person to tease her was the Valkyrie when they were half her height now, out on the dunes where they weren’t allowed. 

Or Max, perhaps. 

Hestia is eying her with interest and Furiosa makes to distract her. “Fine. My feet are so swollen they’ll need to be cut from my boots tonight. Happy?”

“Only a little,” Hestia allows before her eyes become serious. “Soak them in a wash with mineral sands. Have someone rub them if you can.”

Furiosa doesn’t respond, but her expression must. Hestia laughs and laughs into her bowl. “Who,” Furiosa asks, “would I ask to rub my feet?”

“Well,” the woman is eventually able to quiet her laughter, “that’s what he’s for isn’t he?” 

Furiosa doesn’t dignify that with an answer. 

“Where is he anyway? Haven’t had a good look at him.” The old mother likes to know what’s going on around the town, can likely name each and every one of its occupants. 

“Earlier? Down in the garages.” When she’d gone to see him his sleeves were rolled up, dirtied with grease and sweat. Two pups were on either side of him. One a former war boy and the other a small girl from below. There wasn’t much talking, though he spared a few words for her. Otherwise the children pointed and occasionally Max would grunt an answer. 

“Alternator.”

“This?” 

“Choke.”

“And this?”

“…engine block.” 

He didn’t seem to mind his small audience, so after making her own comments, she’d left him for her own work. 

Cleaning up and getting the Interceptor to run will take some time. How much time does he have? 

“Well if you don’t want him, I’ll take him,” Hestia interrupts her reverie. 

“He isn’t mine to give.” She instantly regrets her cool tone. Hestia knows just as well as she and the sisters what it’s like to have your life taken. “I’m sorry,” she says, voice stilted. Imperators don’t say sorry, but generals do if they intend to keep lunch company. 

“Sometimes it’s alright, if you’re both giving.” Hestia’s expression is open, but her eyes are far away. Like herself and the sisters, the others had full lives before they were taken. 

Furiosa speaks rarely of her mother. Who does Hestia speak rarely of?

Furiosa eats as much of her plate as she can, otherwise she’ll be chastised. She is anyway. It still feels alien. No one would ask an Imperator how they felt—they’d know. Imperators hunger for blood and thirst for the waters of Valhalla. No one would ask Water Town’s general either, why would they? Now it seems as though every acquaintance and black thumb wants to know her blood pressure. Which feels low. She wasn’t lying when she told Max she sometimes craved meat—must be the iron. 

After lunch she leaves Hestia to her work and contemplates her afternoon. It’s quiet and she should spend it in her rooms, going over Capable’s reports. But she would rather spend it seeing what Toast and Max have cobbled together or the headway he’s made on his own car. 

Or perhaps whatever he’s up to now. When she’d asked earlier he’d looked thoughtful, hands skimming through a can of screws looking for the right fit. “Going to watch Nettle,” he’d said and she wasn’t a bit surprised. 

Nettle will likely drag him to all her favorite places. No matter how much time she spends with her mother in the green houses, Nettle still loves to wander the green rows. 

Furiosa understands. She remembers the solace of The Green Place, amidst the sun beaten desert. Knowing it was just a speck in a pit. Not knowing when or if the sands would overtake it. 

Nettle won’t know that fear. And neither will hers. 

But if she isn’t there, she could be in the library. What was once the vault for Joe’s most prized possessions is now a sort of central hub. Stacked high with books on topics that have no bearing on their world now and full of filings about the ins and outs of their town. 

Cheedo takes Nettle up amongst the books to learn her letters and has a mind to take one of the old bedrooms and transform it into a class. Furiosa wouldn’t have blamed the sisters had they wished to burn the bedding and lock the rooms, but Capable took the sheets for washing, moved the beds for those that needed them, and set up something new.

“You missed them,” Capable says, from her desk as she walks in—or lumbers rather. It’s hard to keep up a formidable gait when you feel like you might topple. “Assuming you’re looking for the little queen and her accomplice.” 

“Was the queen in to learn her letters?” 

“Oh yes, though she was rather put off when she learned Max could read better than her. I think he would have let her keep on believing, but I let it slip.” 

The Dag’s girl is competitive, a good quality, but Furiosa wonders if Max panders too much. The world doesn’t always work in your favor, especially not this one. Nettle will learn one way or another. 

“Did you try and put him to work, too?” 

“No, not yet,” Capable says sly, “Maybe once he gets tired of all of you.” 

Possible, though Furiosa doubts it. Max can read and write, though his penmanship was shit last time she saw it. But there’s something about working quietly with paper and ink that sets him on edge. Perhaps too close a reminder of how things used to be. 

“Max took her up to the gardens.” 

“Oh? Not dragged there?” 

“No. He needed help with something.” 

“With what?” Furiosa can feel her eyes narrowing. 

“No clue.” Capable lies without looking up, though she’s smiling down at her reports. When Furiosa huffs, she laughs as she turns on her heel to leave. “Have fun.” 

Having fun doesn’t usually sound so ominous. 

\---

It’s hard to call any of their days nice. It’s hot in the day and cold at night. If there are clouds they’re a cruel reminder of the evaporation not yet heavy enough to fall, and likely not safe to drink, if it did. 

A nice day she supposes, is when the winds don’t pick up to build a dust storm, but are mild enough to help cool off the rock. In the gardens, it’s easier to imagine what a nice day might have been. The rich scent of growing foliage and the heady scent of new dirt. A nice day then, is one spent in the green towers. 

Max didn’t see the green towers when they road back with the Immortan’s body, his blood in her veins and her fire in his guts. 

He wandered back quietly, many days later, and no one remembered by sight the scruffy man who’d held their general up on his shoulder. No one but her and the sisters, who insisted he have a shave so they might recognize him better. That first return was quiet. He wasn’t near as feral as he was when they first met out in the dust, a sweaty clash of limbs and animal ferocity. But he was just as withdrawn, watched with dull eyes their progress, their defenses, their full stomachs. 

It was like he anticipated their failure, and didn’t have the heart to watch them fail, but had the masochism to drag himself back to inspect their bones. 

She remembers how he looked as the sisters brought him to the gardens while she trailed behind. The Dag spoke of what she learned of green things. Toast described their process in revitalizing the earth. Capable spoke of output, but also the many different words they were learning to describe the green. 

_Emerald, mint, viridian, pine _, Cheedo recited.__

__Max expected to find ghosts in the Citadel, instead he found the green towers stacked above Water Town. All alive._ _

__In the gardens it seems like the world is miles away, the dirt and hurt that killed so many. But it’s not. It’s on their doorstep, knocking, and should they forget, if they’re taken unawares… No wonder Max ran._ _

__It’s afternoon and the rows are quiet, no one running amuck. Perhaps they’re eating or resting in the hottest hour of the day. She follows a row quietly, enjoying the mild breeze that tousles the growing leaves together. Soothing, though strange._ _

__She hears them first. Max’s low grumbling tone and Nettle’s childish lilt. They’re seated on the stone, beneath the shade of a tall hydroponic system. Max is seated with one leg, the braced one, straight out, and Nettle’s beside him, legs crossed._ _

__What’s between them she isn’t certain. Besides well, trash. More aptly, it’s discarded brush from the harvested plants. The cutting that can’t be eaten, that are diced up and recycled into the earth. That and old twine and… rags are around their feet. She can’t fathom what Max is doing, that Nettle would find so enthralling._ _

__Nettle doesn’t notice her approach, but as soon as her boots click on the stone Max’s eyes shoot up._ _

__“Furiosa,” Nettle says her name properly this time as her eyes shoot up from Max’s hands. “We’re making toys.”_ _

__“Toys?”_ _

__“Toys,” Max confirms. Even with context, what he’s doing now makes little sense. He sees her watching and gestures for her to come closer. Staying on foot would likely be best, but she’s tired and gingerly lowers herself and her weight into a sit. She does not accept Max’s hand when it twitches upwards._ _

__“Why are you making toys?” Furiosa finally asks._ _

__The question momentarily stumps the two. Nettle looks like she’s working on a rebuttal, but Max’s brows are creased. She isn’t sure she likes that._ _

__“Children should have toys,” he says simply._ _

__“I like toys,” Nettle elaborates._ _

__“And these toys are for… you?”  
Nettle’s fingers twist into dried grass. “Max said if I helped I could have some too.” _ _

__Furiosa can feel her brows set, tries to hide it. “I see. Did you have toys when you were small?”_ _

__“Some,” Max says, fingers still twisting in the brush. He looks thoughtful. “And a dog.”_ _

__“Are you going to go find a dog then too?”_ _

__“I like dogs,” his voice clicks, “Do you want one?”_ _

__“They’re useful, but—” Furiosa isn’t sure if her exasperation is fond or annoyed. Isn’t sure if she’s relieved or irritated when Nettle interrupts, “I don’t have many toys, but I like them. My blanket too.” She looks so serious that Furiosa is certain there would be hell to pay if either she or Max told anyone what they heard._ _

__“What are you making then?” Furiosa asks._ _

__“Did you have toys, when you were small?” Max asks instead of answering, and her lips purse._ _

__“No, not really. But there was much to do.” He’s quiet as if he doesn’t believe her. “I also had a blanket,” she tells Nettle, giving her the same serious look she’d been given._ _

__“I won’t tell,” the little girl promises._ _

__“We’re making,” Max stumbles then, maybe he doesn’t have the word. But he gestures down and now Furiosa notices the shapes in the grass. Her hand reaches out to pick one up, the grass prickly against the pads of her flesh fingers. They’re vaguely humanoid in shape._ _

__“We’re making dolls,” Nettle explains while Max nods. “These are fun, but they aren’t very soft.”_ _

__“And what will you do about that?” Furiosa wonders, looking at their mess, but Nettle is already reaching out to clutch some rags. “Max said he would sew.”_ _

__“Can you?” Max looks peculiarly as though he’s embarrassed. Not by sewing. Any road warrior worth her bullets knows how to throw a stitch. But Nettle seems to pull, not unkindly, at Max’s seams, undoing stitches one by one._ _

__“Enough to fix a rip.” Max’s hands stalling._ _

__“It’s not as soft as blanket, but she should like it.”_ _

__“They like to have something to hold. When you aren’t there to hold them.” Max cuts in after Nettle, to explain._ _

__“I didn’t have a toy like that when I was small,” Furiosa argues, without realizing that she’s arguing._ _

__“Nettle. Go take a look t’see if there’s a thinner set.” Max rolls a piece of twine between his finger and thumb before handing it to her._ _

__Eager to help she scampers away, and Furiosa’s eyebrows raise at Max. He looks after the girl, then to his hands, then to her, then over her shoulder._ _

__“Just because you didn’t, doesn’t mean she shouldn’t.”_ _

__“This world hurts. You can’t just pretend that it doesn’t.”_ _

__“It’s good for them. Psychologically?” The word stumbles from his mouth._ _

__“Psychologically?” Furiosa scoffs and her heart thrums. Like it had during their first fight in the dirt astride the rig, in the battle afterwards, and every other night of passion between them. “The Vuvalini raise their girls to be strong.”_ _

__“She can still be strong.”_ _

__“My child won’t need to be coddled.”_ _

__Another man might argue her choice of words, but Max’s brow crinkles for another reason. “Coddled?”_ _

__“In this world, we need to be strong.”_ _

__“Is the world worth it?” He speaks quickly, quicker than she’s heard him. Usually he takes his time, picks his words carefully. More likely to listen than interject. But he does now. Uses her words against her. “If you believe it’s worth it, you have to be willing to go a different way.”_ _

__They’re her words. Not just parroted back, and Max looks at her, then over her shoulder, than back. She has words to say, but says nothing as Nettle pads back, twine curled around her wrist and dragging behind her in the dirt and stone._ _

__She presents her find to Max who raises it to get a better look. “Good,” he announces._ _

__“One,” Furiosa finally says, “Maybe one.”_ _

__Max looks up and though he doesn’t smile, there are no lines on his face that dictate a frown. Nearly the same. His expression is open and flat, clear. It’s an expression she returns._ _

__Furiosa will raise her child to be strong, as the Vuvalini did before her. She will, like her mother and initiate mother before her, teach her to shoot, to fight, and should the many mothers before her help, show her how to channel the dirt below into something new. Something worth it. She will teach her child to be strong, for both this world—and the next._ _


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heads up: This chapter includes nsfw content near the end. Enjoy!

Furiosa stays with Max and Nettle for a while longer. It’s comfortable, as comfortable as she can be. And when Nettle asks why she keeps fidgeting and grimacing, she explains that the child within her likes to kick about.

“Maybe she’s bored,” Nettle offers helpfully. “When she’s out, I’ll play with her.”

“That’ll be a while yet.” Max warns, continues when Nettle’s eyes settle on him. “At first they’re so small they can’t do much of anything.” His hand, still holding the twine, raises to accentuate his words. “Except eat. And wake others up.”

“Did I do that?” the girl asks, eyes scrunched up. 

“Yes,” Furiosa tells her. Yes she did. 

Later Nettle makes Furiosa help her with the dolls (they need clothes, she explains), but her metal arm, slimmer and less heavy than her usual one, has trouble twisting the grass. It’s good for screws and fixing wiring, but the dry grass slips between the metal hinges like fabled silk. 

When she stands to excuse herself, she finds she can’t do it alone and tries not to scoff when Max slips a hand under her elbow. He was always good for stabilizing. Either herself or her guns. Before leaving, Nettle places a small hand on the rise of her stomach and solemnly says, “Be good,” before returning to her grass minions. 

Max nods at her and she knows… something. There’s something in that look. 

She doesn’t see him for the rest of the day. One of their rigs, _the_ rig, has a failing engine that the boys are having trouble cracking. They’d dragged back what was left of it after the rock riders had picked out its guts. Hollow, torn up and misshapen, probably better off as scrap, but something in her wanted it fixed. So, piece by piece they’d dragged it back—not a priority, she wasn’t so sentimental to disturb more important tasks. 

She’s driven it out, filled to the brim with water and other goods. Toast has driven it too. 

It’s a long day and she can’t do as much as she used to, so it ends with Capable’s reports. The night is dark and little moonlight filters through the high narrow windows of her room. The lamp light is warm and she’s lost of track of time when her door creaks open, Max slipping in. 

Neither of them speak, which is just fine, but Max fetches her second chair and drags it towards her desk. 

The tea canister clicks against the table and she shouldn’t be surprised. Silently she tips some of it into the cup he brought and takes a sip as she fills in one of Capable’s columns. 

They fall into a rhythm only disturbed when Max pats down his pockets, pulls out a heel of hard dense bread. Her eyes flick to it. 

“Hungry?” he asks. 

‘’I stopped at the kitchens before coming up.” She gestures towards the tin plate to her left, covered in crumbs and an apple core she’d been picking at.

“Trade?” He gestures towards the core. 

“That’s a poor trade,” she says as he leans forward, places the bread on her plate and plucks up the remaining fruit. She watches in amusement as he inspects it, before taking a bite of out of the end with the stem with an audible snap. “It wouldn’t go to waste, we’d recycle it,” she says, unknowingly mimicking Cheedo from this morning. 

“I like the texture,” he says. “Everything else out there—like sand.” 

When you’re out on the wastes, everything’s like sand. Your food, your water, the air you breathe. 

“Not meat though,” he grumbles between bites and she nods. 

“No, not red meat,” she sighs. Her fingers pick at her bread, thoughts on the wastes. “What’s news?” Max’s eyes glint as he chews. 

Sometimes Max has nothing to say about where he’s been. He shrugs and asks something else, or if he’s lacking in etiquette, falls silent until someone else picks up the thread of conversation.

Now he considers and his voice picks up to tell her of the place he got the seeds. Far off. Too far off for alliances. A spring that supplies the cool water that helps small plants grow. There are other smaller water resources out there, spread and distant—always in danger of drying up. Of being taken over. 

There are other places, like the night bog. Where the stagnant water pools and gnarled plants may take root. You mustn’t eat those greens. No matter how hungry you become. 

Between bites of her bread she takes sips of her tea, can feel her arms grow heavy. He has exhausted his stories and she wonders what new scars they’ve given hm. It’s with this thought that she stands, “Well. I’m going to sleep.” 

She expects him to follow, but as she sits on her pallet to pull at her boots, she realizes he hasn’t stood. His expression is cautious. 

“What is it?” She asks bluntly, not certain what expectation she’ll need to beat out of him. If he thinks he should stay far after his dreams the night before…

He remains quiet and her voice is about to raise when his eyes dart, voice more muddled than she’s heard it all day. “Toast says you haven’t named her?”

“What?” Her tone is neutral, trying to mask her surprise. 

“Said you… haven’t named her.”

“Or him.” She says off handedly, Max looks wary. She’s been cross with the girls when they ask and ask and ask. Did they tell him she’d be cross? She feels a bit cross, but also surprised. “You couldn’t have been sneakier? When you asked?” 

He looks thoughtful. Pauses. “No.” 

No, Max can sneak into camps with a can of guzzoline and his guts. But sneaking into a conversation? No. Furiosa sighs. “Come to bed.”

After a moment he gets up to follow and drags the spare chair back to its corner. Drops his shirt into it, unbuckles his trousers next. 

Furiosa watches from the bed as she unclips the buckles at her shoulder. She eyes the muscles of his back, the ripple under the webbing of raised tattooed markings. He hadn’t shown her at first, the muzzle still weighing on his brain. He saw hers first, she remembers. 

She remembers how his fingers had traced over the raised marks stretched with time. Etched into her skin when she was first taken. The mark they share on their necks that give them away—Joe’s chattel.

His rough finger pads had left her back, wrapped around to graze her taunt stomach. She remembers that he had nosed against the back of her neck, at the band there. 

His breath was warm. 

Now he’s looking at her oddly, but she gestures him towards her. Where to begin? She isn’t sure she knows as he approaches. Lowers himself to sit on the other side of the pallet. 

“The Vuvalini don’t name their children. Not at first.” It’s a good enough place to start. And true. “The Green Place was beautiful, we didn’t go hungry. But there was still danger.” She gestures without meaning to, with the stump of her arm. “There was still death, the diseases of this world. Many didn’t make it to their 60th day, and if a child didn’t, then her name was only carried by her mother.”

Max’s eyes are on her. “But there are—names?” 

“It would be hard not to think of some,” she admits. “But no, I won’t pick until she—or he—is older. Until I can see who they will be.”

“Furiosa,” he says, and she’s momentarily surprised. He doesn’t often say names, his speech direct, often lacking subjects. A question doesn’t follow, and his eyes glint, mouth twisted wry. She knows what he means and she laughs lowly. 

“My initiate name. My initiate mother saw my spirit and named me Furiosa. Does it fit?”

“Sometimes,” Max says after a pause. He does not ask for her womb name, which is fine. Her mother, rest her, carries that with her. 

His next question comes after a pause, uncertain again. “What are…” He doesn’t finish, wonders if he’s made a mistake. 

And honestly, she isn’t sure if he has. She wonders if the many mothers before her broke their silence on their names, but she has no reference. It seems too personal a question to ask the surviving Vuvalini. Surely she should just know. Just as she’ll just ‘know’ her child’s name. Right?

“Some mothers chose names based on attributes, or hopes for the future.” Her initiate name fits that bill, actually. “But others.” She falters. “Sometimes we name our children after the dead, to give them their strength, their guidance.”

He seems to be considering this, and she’s surprised by the words that tumble unbidden from her mouth. “Do I move forwards or do I move backwards?”

His eyes, white in the dark, find hers. “Sometimes you move forwards by moving backwards.” 

She almost doesn’t ask, but she’s curious. “And you? What would you choose?” 

Max looks surprised and for a moment she’s worried she’s lost him, but his eyes flicker back. She’s sorry to push, but she does anyway. “Is there anyone you want to remember?” 

Max is looking over her shoulder, his jaw tightens then relaxes. “My wife and child?” he asks—she didn’t say, but she didn’t need to. Both are wounds. “No.” He licks his lip, settles, decision made. “No. They should rest. This is no place for them.” 

“No one then?” She doesn’t mean to pry, she never has and neither has he, but.

For a moment it seems like he won’t respond, but his brow creases and his lips part. 

“Nyx.” 

“Excuse me?”

“Nyx. A wasteland girl. A Savannah girl.” He’s not smiling, but there’s something in his eyes. “Didn’t listen to me none.” 

“Where is she now?”

His arm swoops out, to gesture, “They made it out.” 

“Sounds like a story.”

“It is.”

“Later.”

No smile, but the lines at his eyes crease. “Mm.” Then he bites at his lip. “I think… maybe they made it.”

It’s an odd thing to say, but Furiosa is used to the odd things he says. The things he dreams. What keeps him coming and going. 

“What makes you say that?”

“You did,” he says and his eyes are on her now. 

“Come here,” she sighs. She feels heavy and big but light in the moment, as her hand slips around his neck, grazes the brand there. Her lips find his. 

When she moves, he moves. When she breathes, he breathes. His eyes flutter shut and Furiosa says what she’d like to say. A soft exhale, “I want you.” 

Max dives back into the kiss after a pause. His hand slips between them, heavy on her side. When she nudges her hips forward he slips his fingers between her underclothes. She can feel him harden, can feel his fingers as they slip between her folds, can feel as she grows wetter with every grind of his thumb against her. 

Teeth tug on his lips and he gestures for her to move. To slide upwards and he’ll slide down. 

“No,” Furiosa gasps. Her arm, the nub, rests on his shoulder, lowers to his chest to push him gently down. “Like you said before.” She feels fiendish when she sees his eyes.

It’s a little ungainly, but she strips off his underclothes and hers too, moves to straddle him. It’s hard when her center of gravity is off, but his hand curls around the crook of her elbow, holds her steady as her hand slips down between them. 

She can feel how hard he is as her hips settle at the crux of his hips. Every twitch of hers drag them closer together. She grinds just to hear him groan. 

When she reaches down, his skin is soft, will feel so good when she slides him within her. But for now she just settles against his cock, dips her hips, but not low enough. Not low enough for either of them. 

“…Revenge?” he murmurs, eyes bright. 

“Maybe,” Doubtlessly, she thinks, as her hips slide down, his prick finally in her just right, and the suddenness has her tensing. 

“Good?” he grinds out, one hand still at the crook of her elbow, the other splayed on one of her thighs. 

“Yes,” her hips circle, the pressure nearly unbearable, so different than usual. Her hips rise, drop down. “Hard to get—leverage though.” 

He grunts, thighs rising to rest against her backside, to give her another brace. 

“Good,” she works against him again, sets a rhythm to her liking, which he matches with each rise of his hips, flex of his thighs. 

It’s harder than usual, when she could take her pleasure however she wanted. But there’s something in her that is deeply satisfied with each shaky rise of her hips, the fullness in her. 

Her hand reaches behind her, steadies herself on his thigh. He still stabilizes her forearm with one hand. The other smooths across her hip, over the curve of her stomach, the swell of her breast. Then his hands trail down and he finds her, rolls his thumb in a circle around her swollen flesh. “ _Yes_ ,” she commands, thighs picking up speed, his own matching. 

Full and swollen, blood pounding in her ears. When she looks down his eyes are on her. They don’t waver. They don’t flick over her shoulder, don’t look away for an escape route, not even for a second. 

They’re on her. 

The pressure builds until it’s too much. At the tipping point, until it bubbles over and her back arches, the muscles in her legs stuttering. “Keep on,” she grits, and his hips snap up, each tremor of her body magnified by each brush of pressure. She’s gasping, and she knows he’s close as his hips pick up speed. Knows he’s coming when he moans, deep and guttural, pushes himself upwards, nearly into a sit. 

It’s awkward with her stomach between them, but he leans forward, finds her lips and licks into her mouth. She drives her hips, keeps the pace as he shutters, breathy as hips jerk. She wrings it from him. 

When he settles his body is still strung, eyes hooded, still trained on her. Hands slide on her hips, slide around to trace down her back, against the raised lines of flesh. 

“Good?” she asks.

He contemplates. Too long for a simple question, but it is not a simple question. “Hmhm.” He stops, rethinks. Says, “Yes.”

In the morning they wake together, take breakfast. Then she has her duties and he works on the Interceptor, fiddling with the engine block. He sees Nettle, helps the girls and looks over her defense improvements carefully. They talk in bits and pieces. Of Savannah children and those left behind. Of those that left others behind. 

On the fifteenth day, the car runs. On the sixteenth day he wakes early and leaves. He is not back by nightfall, and he is not back by morning.


	10. Chapter 10

Furiosa discovered she was pregnant, not because she missed her moon cycle, something that always came when it chose, either because of diet or stress. Furiosa realized she was pregnant when she threw up outside the rig she and Toast were working on. 

For a moment Toast looked stricken, as if the sight of a visibly ill Furiosa was an omen and she was next. Then she realized that bile and blood wasn’t coming up too, and Furiosa likely didn’t have what those east of the White Plains called stomach rot. 

“Come on,” Toast said, one hand on Furiosa’s shoulder while she bent over, wiping her wrist against her mouth. 

“I’m fine,” Furiosa argued, but Toast, who barked at black thumbs and pups around the chop shop daily, who’d spat in the Immortan’s ruined face, was not easily swayed. 

“Oi. Come on,” she groused back, tugging on Furiosa’s arm. She could easily pull away with her arm’s hydraulics, but she did not. “You always tell us to get checked out, to take advantage of the healers. Besides, what if you throw up a second time? In my—I mean, the rig.” 

Furiosa didn’t call her out for her cheek, which was suspicious. Toast figured it out: “You’ve been throwing up. Come on.”

Not ideal, but Toast had a point. They left the rig for later and went up to the Organic’s old blood shed. A much more welcoming place nowadays. Old blankets coated the cots. There was a war boy sleeping while getting a transfusion, the blood now donated freely.

Stitch had her sit down while he went through a list. He was an old man, used to giving medicine out on the wastes. Before he was chewed up too many times and found himself as one of Joe’s wretched. An old pair of spectacles sat on his nose, but they weren’t quite right and he had a habit of squinting. 

Behind him Hospic bustled about disinfecting tools. She was full bodied and strong, which was good when dealing with unruly patients. 

Like Furiosa. 

“Probably ate something bad.”

“We all eat the same,” Toast argued and Furiosa shot her a look. 

Stitch went through possible symptoms and she admitted she’d been sick repeatedly over the past few days. Usually in the morning, or when she stood too quickly. It always passed and she felt fine, so she refused to think the worst. 

Toast glowered and rolled her eyes. When Stitch asked about her blooding, she admitted it hadn’t come yet, but, the window was still wide and she had skipped before.

The head medic asked about her nutrition, but behind him Hospic cleared her throat. She faced them, drying towel balled up in her hand on her hip. “When was the last time you fucked?” The room went silent, so she clarified, “With a man.”

“Could be that,” Stitch allowed, picking up on the silence. He fiddled with the old tarnished stethoscope around his neck. 

Toast’s lips were parted slightly, eyes clouded as she figured it out for herself. It would be obvious after all. 

“About 40 days,” Furiosa said, after calculating how many days it was since his car kicked up dust behind him. 

“Alright then. Could be that.” Hospic pushed herself into Furiosa’s space and Stitch out. Asked about her temperature, felt her lymph nodes. Furiosa argued blandly, did not return Toast’s looks. When Hospic said they’d know for sure in a few weeks, she nodded, said, “Ok.” Then shook her head, “I’m pregnant?” 

“Might be. Will you want to keep it?” 

“I didn’t think I could. I couldn’t.” 

“You let blood, don’t you?”

“Yes, but I didn’t think I could. I never did before.” 

Hospic nodded, but repeated herself carefully, “Will you want to keep it?” 

Honestly she replied, “I don’t know.” Then, she went back to work, because work was something Furiosa did.  
In the shop she ignored Toast, otherwise she would snap at her. 

She worked, forgot dinner, was busy rubbing rust off of a car door—idle work—when Capable came to fetch her. 

“We’re having dinner in the library. Come?”

Furiosa could have snapped again, but when Capable’s hand brushed her shoulder, as Toast’s had earlier, she sighed. Silently agreed. 

Capable’s library, where she kept track of the ins and outs of Water Town, was not as plush as it once was. The extra blankets and fine things had long since been distributed amongst those who had none. 

But for all the horrors that occurred there, it was a fine room. Especially at night, when the lamps burned low. Through the glass there was nothing but the black expanse of night and the many pin pricks of stars. 

They sat against the cushions by the glass dome. There was food, and while they would urge her to touch it, she could not taste the flavors on her tongue. 

The Dag was curled against the glass, Cheedo by her side, and Cheedo’s eyes were on her the moment she entered the room. Toast sat apart and her eyes darted away, looking petulant with one arm thrown over her knee. 

Toast had told them all. It wasn’t surprising. Furiosa wasn’t angry, she knew they were sisters. She also remembered a long time ago, sitting around the lamplight in this room, all five of them—no six. When they were wrapped in muslin still. 

Cheedo was the first to speak, “How are you feeling, Furiosa?”

When she sighed, Toast jumped in, “You wouldn’t talk to me—you skipped dinner. So I told them.”

“I wanted to think.” Furiosa thought _she_ sounded petulant. 

“So you did,” Toast snapped, “Do you want to talk now?” 

“No,” Furiosa snapped back, before softening as Capable took a seat beside her. “Maybe.” 

They were quiet as Capable pushed her a plate. After a moment she asked, “Do you want to keep it?”

“I don’t know.” 

“Did you ever want to be a mother?” Cheedo asked.

“To the Vuvalini motherhood is an honor—either by birth or by initiate. I’d thought maybe I’d be a mother. Then I thought not.” Taken instead and made a tool. “I didn’t want to bring a daughter into a world like that.” To be taken by Joe, used as war fodder, or if she grew to be whole and fair…

“Now?” Cheedo pushed. 

“I don’t know. Maybe.” 

“Well, you have time,” Dag spoke, her hand around Cheedo’s shoulder, fingers in her hair. 

“Mmhm,” Furiosa licked her lip and extended herself, “Did you think about…?” 

“Of course,” Dag’s blue eyes were electric in the dim. “Didn’t want nothing of his. Didn’t much want to be a mum either.”

“Would you have regretted it?” Furiosa asked. She knew how much the Dag grew to love her daughter.

“Well, I wouldn’t have known, would I? Probably not. Though I’m glad now.” 

Quiet again, and Furiosa tried to eat some more as Toast stared out into the black and Cheedo traced the rim of her mug with the tip of her finger. 

“Is it Max’s?” Cheedo asked, large eyes rising from her cup to catch Furiosa’s eye.

Dag snorted, as though it was obvious, but Furiosa didn’t give her the benefit of a cool gaze. Just said, “Yes.”

“Will you tell him?” 

“He comes and goes. I can’t just go fetch him.”

“If you’re big, it’ll be a hell of a surprise,” Toast said before Cheedo could say what had been on her mind all night.

“Do you think he would stay?”

From the corner of Furiosa’s eye she could see Capable’s expression, as if to chide Cheedo—but the girl already knew and looked down at her hands.

“That’s for him to decide.” She had found what she needed many days ago on the fury road. What Max needed, she didn’t know. 

If even he knew. 

“It wouldn’t change things,” she continued after a moment. Her body was hers. Hers to do what she wanted with it, to be a mother like the many mothers before her, or not. But she did wonder what he would think. She remembered how he’d held Nettle when she was all but tiny. His large hands cupping the crook of her neck, supporting the skull. He’d held her until she wanted to feed. Held her quietly while the girls talked and laughed around him. While Furiosa watched. 

They’d asked her to hold the babe too. When she was still pink and wrinkled flesh. Furiosa declined. Certainly metal wouldn’t be a comfortable support for a being so small, so used to the comforts of the womb. 

“Well, there is plenty of time,” Capable assured. “Who wants to hear what Hestia told me today?” Her expression was sly—whatever it was, it was likely equal parts funny and filthy. 

The Dag crowed for her to go on, but Cheedo shot Furiosa a furtive look and Toast’s eyes still strayed out beyond the glass. 

Furiosa was good at thinking on her feet. Having the time to mull over her options was a hindrance in its own way. This wouldn’t be planning an oil run or a trade agreement. It was something else entirely. 

But she had time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long wait, life's been a little..... crazy!  
> Hit me up on [Tumblr.](http://pieribee.tumblr.com/)


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